SNAAP 2022 Survey

New Pricing | New Focus | New Leadership | New Home

Welcome to the new home for the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP) at SnaapArts.org. We are in the process of building a new website. Please bookmark this page.

The next SNAAP survey will be administered in Fall 2022 and will offer:

  • Significantly reduced fee structure (by as much as 54%)
  • New focus on diversity, inclusion, and equity
  • Questions designed to measure the impact of COVID-19 on the lives and careers of arts alumni
  • More inclusive survey administration
  • Greater emphasis on field-wide insight

Timeline | Registration

SNAAP’s new model has moved from annual surveying to once every five years as institutional leaders found their data did not change considerably from year to year. We anticipate fielding the survey every five years into the future.

  • Registration for participation: Opens Fall 2021. Please fill out this brief FORM to receive registration information. This is not a commitment to participate. SNAAP is collecting interest and updating its database of contacts.
  • Survey administration: Fall 2022

Cost to Participate

Fees for participation in the 2022 SNAAP survey have been reduced by as much as 54% from previous survey cycles, and are based on the number of arts degrees conferred by your institution in 2018-19 verifiable by IPEDS data as reported to the U.S. Department of Education.

  • Tier 1: <100 grads $1,500
  • Tier 2: 100-199 grads $2,000
  • Tier 3: 200-299 grads $3,000
  • Tier 4: 300-449 grads $4,000
  • Tier 5: 450 grads & up $5,500
  • One-time registration fee of $200 for all tiers

The emphasis of the 2022 SNAAP survey is to significantly expand survey participation to get the clearest picture of the field as possible. Please contact info@snaaparts.org directly if costs are prohibitive. SNAAP may be able to assist.

Sponsorship Level Participation

Should your institution be interested in helping to underwrite the participation of institutions that are unable to afford the fees, please consider participating at the sponsorship level of $7,500.

SNAAP is committed to expanding participation in the 2022 survey as much as possible and encourages wealthier institutions to support these efforts and help strengthen the valuable field-wide data that will be delivered by the 2022 survey.

In addition to receiving all SNAAP benefits and reports (outlined below), sponsorship level participants will receive recognition on the new SNAAP website, SNAAP newsletter and social media channels.

SNAAP - Then and Now

The Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP) is a national survey of alumni of art and design departments, schools and colleges. The survey collects feedback on alumni educational satisfaction and outcomes in their professional, creative and personal lives.

SNAAP is led by Arts + Design Alumni Research, a nonprofit organization dedicated to data-driven innovation in postsecondary and professional arts education. The mission of Arts + Design Alumni Research is to maximize the success and impact of creatives in society by driving evidence-informed change in training and illuminating the value of arts and design education.

Since 2008, SNAAP has collected and analyzed data from over 200,000 arts graduates from across North America and has helped change the national conversation on the value of an arts degree. Over 300 colleges and universities have participated in the study and SNAAP data have been used for assessment, curriculum reform, recruitment, benchmarking, alumni engagement, advocacy, and more.

In its first decade, SNAAP operated as a project of the Indiana University School of Education’s Center for Postsecondary Research. The work is now being transferred to a new consortium of institutions, headed by the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. Arts + Design Alumni Research is the nonprofit organization with a national board of directors created in 2018 to oversee the work.

View SNAAP reports and national findings from previous surveys HERE.

Responding to New Needs for Insights

SNAAP was created to respond to the need for clear and reliable data, articulated by arts training institutions almost 20 years ago. At this time, SNAAP is again taking action to respond to the forward-looking information needs of the arts in higher education. To best support the use of SNAAP by the higher education field, arts professionals, policymakers and researchers, SNAAP has gathered and critically reflected on input from higher education leaders, arts faculty and research scholars to inform how it can best build on the strengths of its first decade and best serve the arts in higher education field in the new decade.

SNAAP will offer key updates to the design and administration of the 2022 survey, including:

  • A more inclusive, expanded survey administration. The 2022 survey will include more robust recruitment of a greater diversity of arts schools and alumni.
  • Emphasis on national findings. With a new emphasis on expanding participation, the 2022 SNAAP survey will provide a clearer picture of the systemic forces that impact the lives and careers of artists and better institutional benchmarking.
  • Impact of Covid-19 on arts alumni. The 2022 SNAAP will explore the enormous and likely lasting disruption the COVID-19 pandemic has created in the lives and careers of artists and creatives providing data-driven insights on how schools can prepare future artists.
  • Diversity, equity and inclusion. The 2022 survey will survey a more diverse pool of alumni respondents with demographic questions attending to race and ethnicity, sexual orientation and ability/disability as well as alumni perceptions of belonging and inclusion.

New Leadership

SNAAP is now managed as a three-way partnership between the University of Texas College of Fine Arts, the College of Fine and Applied Arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Arts + Design Alumni Research.

University of Texas College of Fine Arts College of Fine and Applied Arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

UT Austin is the base of SNAAP’s management, and UIUC oversees the research activities. Lee Ann Scotto Adams is the new executive director of SNAAP at UT Austin, and Dr. Jennifer Novak-Leonard, research associate professor at UIUC, serves as SNAAP’s research director.

SNAAP Executive Director:
Lee Ann Scotto Adams
biography

SNAAP Research Director:
Jennifer Novak-Leonard
biography

SNAAP Board of Directors, President:
Douglas J. Dempster
biography

New Funding

SNAAP Receives $650,000 from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for the 2022 Arts Alumni Survey

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded a three-year grant of $650,000 to Arts + Design Alumni Research to administer the 2022 SNAAP survey. See the press release.

“We’re enormously grateful to The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for recognizing the importance of the country’s art and design schools and the importance of SNAAP to our colleges and universities,” said Douglas Dempster, dean of the UT College of Fine Arts and president of the SNAAP board of directors. “SNAAP is the most thorough and probing source of good alumni-outcome data available to executives and faculty of art and design schools. The research data allows us to quantify our value to higher education and to the cultural life of the nation. The data also guides higher education leaders on program improvements and updates.”

Kevin Hamilton, dean of the UIUC College of Fine and Applied Arts, remarked, “This new effort will add yet greater depth to the evidence-based platform SNAAP has provided arts administrators, educators, scholars and others over the years. By accounting for the ways in which a broader range of arts graduates draw from education in their lives, and especially with respect to the work of artists coming out of minority-serving institutions, SNAAP will help colleges like ours' be of ever greater service in addressing the most needed social and economic reforms.”

FAQ

What Kinds of Institutions Can Participate?
Any institution that offers associate, baccalaureate, graduate degrees, and/or certificates with majors or concentrations in any arts field is eligible to administer the SNAAP survey. Both undergraduate and graduate alumni are included. We define the arts in a broad sense, to include art, architecture, design, media arts, film, music, theater, dance, and creative writing.

Eligible institutions can include: Arts schools, departments, and programs within comprehensive colleges and universities; independent colleges of art, design, and the performing arts; community colleges.

What Are the Benefits of Participating?
Institutions need good data to recruit students, plan effectively, and meet accreditation requirements. Furthermore, data from the 2022 survey should allow participating institutions to understand the new challenges faced by alumni, how they’re coping with those challenges, and how those schools might adjust their programs and career preparation.

Institutions can use their SNAAP data for:

  • Curriculum development and reform
  • Advocacy
  • Benchmarking and strategic planning
  • Alumni engagement and support
  • Recruitment, marketing, public relations, and fundraising
  • Career advising
  • Accreditation and assessment
  • Insight into the systemic forces impacting the lives and careers of alumni on a national level

What Does a Participating Institution Receive?
Institutions receive detailed confidential analyses, including:

  • Institutional Report—Presents your alumni responses to all questions on the SNAAP questionnaire
  • Improved Alumni Records—A national research firm searches for your graduates for whom you do not have an email address and you receive these updates
  • Workshops and Webinars—SNAAP staff help you understand your reports and how to use your data

How Is SNAAP Administered?
SNAAP partners with institutions to administer the survey to all living arts alumni.

  • Step 1: Using templates provided by SNAAP, participating schools provide an alumni data file to SNAAP.
  • Step 2: SNAAP partners with a national research firm to find and correct outdated email addresses for your alumni.
  • Step 3: Institutions can customize invitation messages sent by SNAAP.
  • Step 4: Alumni with valid email addresses receive an email invitation to complete the survey at a secure website.
  • Step 5: SNAAP handles all other aspects of survey administration (follow-up with non-respondents, data collection, and analysis).
  • Step 6: Institutions receive detailed reports in Spring 2023

Arts + Design Alumni Research Board of Directors:

Douglas Dempster, President, Dean Emeritus, College of Fine Arts, The University of Texas at Austin

Jennifer Novak-Leonard, Vice President
Associate Research Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Fine and Applied Arts

Rob Sabal, Secretary
Dean, School of the Arts, Emerson College

Aaron Flagg, Treasurer
Chair and Associate Director, Juilliard Jazz Studies, The Juilliard School

Lorenzo Candelaria
Dean, Blair School of Music, Vanderbilt University

Donna Heiland
Vice Provost, Pratt Institute

Samuel Hoi
President, Maryland Institute College of Art

Laurence D. Kaptain
Dean, College of Arts & Media, University of Colorado Denver

Barbara Korner
Dean Emerita, College of Arts & Architecture, Penn State University

Douglas S. Noonan
Professor, O'Neill School of Public & Environmental Affairs, Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis

Elissa Tenny
President, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

Steven J. Tepper
Dean, Herberger Institute of Design and the Arts, Arizona State University

Raymond Tymas-Jones
President, Cornish College

SNAAP is supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation

Carnegie Melon Tremaine

Photo credits