Only 38 percent of U students have heard of the Presenter’s Office, the cultural arts organ of student government, according to a recently released survey.
Jeppson Research, an outside polling firm, recently conducted a survey for the Presenter’s Office of the Associated Students of the University of Utah, asking students what kind of events they want to see on campus, when the events should be held and how much students are willing to pay for them. The firm surveyed 400 students, which gives the results a 5 percent margin of error.
“It confirms a lot of what we already knew,” said Jenny Thomas, executive director of the office. “We can continue moving ahead with confidence.”
Of the students surveyed, 150 said they had heard of the Presenter’s Office, a part of ASUU that receives 39 percent of its budget, $468,000 next year. Of these students, 143 had attended events sponsored by the office. Concerts were the most often listed events. Sixty-five students said they went to concerts, and 50 students said they remembered going to Mayfest, which was renamed Redfest this year.
Another 27 students said they had attended the lectures and speaker events sponsored by the Presenter’s Office, and four students said they remembered going to a movie sponsored by the Presenter’s Office.
Ninety-seven students said they knew about the office’s discount ticket program, which allows students to pay a reduced price for certain Presenter’s Office events.
Thomas is not worried about the low name recognition of the Presenter’s Office.
“I think the 38 percent is a good number,” she said. “To me it’s a success. Being a new organization, I think that’s a pretty good number. I hope it will go up incrementally.”
The Presenter’s Office has functioned in its current state for the past five years.
The number of students who recall seeing publicity from the Presenter’s Office also pleased Thomas. Of the students surveyed, 43 percent recalled publicity for a Presenter’s Office event, and 25 percent of the surveyed students know about the Presenter’s Office Web site.
Despite the low name recognition of the Presenter’s Office, students expressed support for the kinds of programming the office brings to campus.
The survey asked students to identify events they were most likely to attend, and students generally supported most of the options listed.
Seventy-eight percent of all students surveyed said they would be likely to attend a rock or pop performance at Kingsbury Hall. Local rock concerts, Pioneer Theatre Company performances, world music and free films on a Saturday night also received support from more than 70 percent of the students surveyed.
On the other end of the scale, only 29 percent of the respondents said they would go to a free open mic poetry event on a Saturday night, an event the office has been holding monthly this year.
Many responding students said they enjoyed movies, but only four respondents said they went to the film series sponsored by the Presenter’s Office. According to Thomas, the office is investigating ways to make the free film series more accessible to students. Office leaders have thought about changing the times and locations of the free films or screening each movie more than once.
“This is all really useful for us,” she said. “The survey becomes a tool.”