Dear Masters Student

This is a request to participate in a national survey of currently enrolled postgraduate students at 16 South African universities.

The Department of Science and Technology has commissioned the Centre for Research on Evaluation, Science and Technology (CREST) at Stellenbosch University to conduct a comprehensive study on the retention and conversion of students from undergraduate to honours, honours to masters and masters to doctoral studies. The results of the study are critical to an understanding of postgraduate student retention in South Africa and will also assist our own university to better serve the needs of both current and future postgraduate students.

You are therefore cordially requested to participate in the study by completing an online web-questionnaire. The questionnaire can be accessed by clicking on the following link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/UKZN_Masters

Alternatively you can also copy and paste the link in your web browser which will open the questionnaire. The questionnaire will be active until the 31^st of October 2014.

Your participation is completely voluntary and anonymous. We expect that the questionnaire will take you less than 15 minutes to complete. Any questions about the study can be directed to Milandré van Lill at mhvanwyk@sun.ac.za.

Please note that the study has been approved by the Research Ethics Committee at Stellenbosch University and has the full support of this University.

Thank you for participating in this survey. Your contribution is invaluable.

Issued by the University Research Office