New grads: First Destination Survey

Survey dates

*Your survey access is based on your undergraduate degree completion that you specified in your Application for Degree (a.k.a. "Applying for a degree," and "AFD") as instructed by the University Registrar.

What about students completing graduate degrees?

• The Virginia Tech Graduate School conducts exit surveys with students completing master's and doctoral degrees.

What and why we ask

What we ask:

• Your first destination after your undergraduate degree, whether seeking, employed, military service, volunteering, or continuing education.
• Other information related to your career preparation and experience during college.
• The survey questions are shown, along with the responses, in the graduation year reports.

Why we ask:

1. Reporting your first destination is a step in your GRADUATION TIMELINE specified by the University Registrar.
2. The information is valuable to current and future students — and to academic departments, to advisors who help students, to employers who hire Virginia Tech graduates, and to parents of prospective students. Data from the report are used to respond to a wide variety of internal and external requests for information.
3. Federal law requires that universities provide certain information to current and prospective students. The First Destination Report is used by the Virginia Tech Office of Analytics and Institutional Effectiveness: Student Consumer Information to meet federal requirements for disclosure and reporting of data on "student outcomes," specifically employment and graduate and professional school "placement" following the undergraduate degree.

Why your response matters

You are a part of the university community. Each graduate is an individual with unique interests and goals. Knowing what all graduates do, as a first step after graduation, helps tell a complete and realistic story. Current and future students have the same questions you had: What do grads of my major do?

Because past graduates responded, we can tell you, for the university, by college, and by major:

• First destinations of graduates: employment, continuing education, or seeking.
• Graduate and professional schools reported by grads.
• Employers, job titles and locations reported by grads.
• Salary data.
• What grads wished they had done differently.

All this and more is in the First Destination Report.
Gathering first destination information from graduates has been done since the 1970s; the methods have changed.

On behalf of the university community, we appreciate and THANK everyone who has completed the survey.

Seeking a job or more education?
Not sure yet?
Tell that now, and you can update later.
You have six months after commencement.

• It's common, at the time of graduation, that many grads are in process of seeking employment or admission to continuing education, so simply check that in the survey.
• You can update your response through six months after commencement. Updating is quick and easy; you don't have to re-do the whole survey, just the questions related to your updated situation.
• You are welcome to seek our advising and resources for students to help you with your post-graduation plans.

Confidential and easy

Individual responses are confidential.

• We do not publish individual names or sets of responses attached to individual names.
• We publish and share only aggregate data for majors, colleges, and total university.
• Data on subsets of graduates are analyzed to look for patterns and trends.

This DATA COLLECTION has NOTHING to do with FUNDRAISING efforts by the university.

• We are NOT ASKING for your MONEY, and we do NOT SHARE your INFORMATION with ANYONE who asks for money.

Fast, user-friendly survey

• Under five minutes to complete the survey.

Logging in | PID and passphrase help

• The emails we send you include a link for you to go to the survey in Handshake.
• Or you can use the survey link on this page (above) to log in.
• Login requires your VT PID and passphrase.
• If you need passphrase assistance, or can't remember your passphrase, see: Virginia Tech Password Guide.

Questions about degrees, diplomas, graduation.

• See: Office of the University Registrar: Graduation > Frequently Asked Questions.