Up Front | From the Editor

March 2003: Vol. 82, No. 2

n December, Georgia Magazine conducted a survey to determine who our readers are, what they think of our product, and how good a job we're doing at keeping them abreast of what's going on at America's fastest-rising public university. The results of the survey, I'm happy to report, both echo and quantify the applause and appreciation we hear on an almost daily basis.

Here are some of the highlights of the telephone survey, which was conducted by UGA's Survey Research Center:

Evaluation of quality: Nearly everyone surveyed (97.5%) said Georgia Magazine is good or excellent and compared it favorably to newsstand publications. More than 95% said it is informative, presents balanced views of what's going on at UGA, and is a pleasure to read.
Reading frequency/amount: Sixty percent of those surveyed said they always read the magazine. Two-thirds said they read half or more of each issue, while another one-third skims it.
Most-read sections: The most popular parts of the magazine are the feature stories and the Up Front section.
Reader preferences: More than 95% of those surveyed said they want to read about issues affecting the University and about alumni, while more than 80% indicated an interest in stories about students, faculty, and sports.
Feelings about UGA: Nearly everyone (99.4%) said they are proud to be associated with UGA, 98.8% think it is one of the best public universities in the country, 88.9% feel connected to UGA, and more than 90% said the stories they read in Georgia Magazine contribute to these feelings.
Demographics: The majority of respondents (68%) fell into the 35-64 age range, with nearly equal numbers above and below that range. Slightly more (51%) were male. Most (88.2%) have annual household incomes above $50,000, and nearly half (48.9%) top the $100,000 mark.

These evaluations are in line with the honors GM has received from judges in Council for Advancement and Support of Education competition. In a recent five-year period, Georgia Magazine won a CASE gold medal as the most improved university magazine in the country—and the "before" issues we submitted weren't too shabby, having previously won us a bronze in regional competition two years earlier. In addition, GM writers won two national good medals for the best feature story in the country, and we also had a finalist in that category. In a recent four-year period, GM finished second or third every year among university magazines in the region, and in 2000 we swept the feature writing category, winning gold, silver and bronze.

With two-thirds of our survey respondents saying they're Internet active, I'd also like to remind GM readers what a valuable resource our Web site can be. For example, if you don't have a copy of GM on hand and you want to read our March '03 feature story on Rhodes Scholar Adam Cureton, he's up there in cyber space—along with a special archive on UGA's past Rhodes Scholars. Click on Back Issues and you'll see a variety of archived stories on everything from the Peabody Awards to Uga.

As a service to our readers, our Web site is fully searchable—so if you saw a Class Notes item on your old roommate and need to remind yourself where he or she is living, you can come to us for that, too.

khannon@uga.edu