Surveys are, by their very nature, samples.
Limited in time and coverage, for me a survey offers a path into understanding that needs to proceed via further investigation – more detailed qualitative work, or analysis of administrative data – before it can inform policy.
There are a lot of surveys in higher education policy and these vary in coverage and utility. Some are used directly in regulation, others find their way into political debates that inform regulatory action. Still others drive (and reflect) various popular narratives about universities and how we understand them.
When we see survey results there is a tendency to see them as data, not as a limited set of responses. Surveys in regulation, and indeed surveys in the wider policy debate, need to be caveated heavily – often we don’t get that in anything other than technical documents read by few and understood by fewer.
