Why alumni engagement research?
As higher education market research specialists, we understand the importance of alumni relations in supporting and promoting a university. Engaged alumni with high regard for their university can present both economic and reputational benefits… and vice versa.
But what is really known about which factors drive a sense of connection and engagement for alumni?
Alumni insights from over 130 UK HE institutions
To bring quantitative insight to alumni engagement research, we conducted a survey with over 900 UK graduates to explore alumni perceptions and connections with the university they attended, as well as to provide tangible benchmarks across different alumni groups.
- When asked how connected they felt to their university, the average was 4.8 out of 10, and correlations were seen with both graduation year and proximity to the university.
- Russell Group institutions overall received a positive alumni Net Promoter Score (NPS) of +28.5, while the Post-1992 group received a negative score of -4.7.
- We uncovered 5 key perceptions that appeared to strongly correlate with alumni NPS, including ‘It is a high-quality institution’ and ‘It offers high levels of support to students’.
- 58% of alumni did not actively engage with their universities and only 9% had made a donation.
Interested in your own research?
While this report provides useful benchmarks, we recommend contacting us to compare your NPS to similar institutions, or to discuss any research – alumni or otherwise – that you’re interested in.
- Find out more about the alumni research services we offer.
- Discover which education-related sectors we support.
- Read through our case studies to see how we could help your organisation.
