Respondent Profile - CIRP 1997

A total of 2,805 students completed the CIRP in 1997, which represents approximately 95.9% of the first-time, full-time, first-year students entering USC that year. A basic demographic breakdown of respondents looks like this:

• 55% Female; 45% Male
• 77% Caucasian; 19% African American; 3% Asian American;
  3% American Indian
• 71% say USC is more than 50 miles from their hometown

The Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) is an annual survey administered at colleges and universities nationwide. It allows the Division of Student and Alumni Services to develop a profile of the first-time, full-time students entering the University of South Carolina each year. The survey collects information on each incoming student's background, opinions on current issues, and activities during the last year of high school. The CIRP is administered to incoming students the summer before they actually enroll at USC, during placement testing weekends and new student orientation. Since the survey is administered to incoming students at schools across the country, national norm data are available for all survey items.