Do you read the Hartford Courant regularly? If so, you are probably familiar with what for years was called the Hartford Courant/Institute for Social Inquiry Connecticut Poll.

But did you know that the poll of record for Connecticut residents is produced by the University of Connecticut as well as the Hartford Courant? In the past, that may not have been clear, because there was no mention of the University in the poll's title.

Now that has changed, however. The poll has been renamed the Hartford Courant/UConn Connecticut Poll.

"It was felt both on our part and on the part of the Courant that the poll did not have an explicit enough identification with the University," says G. Donald Ferree, the poll's director, who is also an assistant professor of political science.

The old title referred to the University department that was the co-partner of the poll, Ferree says, but many people were not aware that the Institute for Social Inquiry is a part of UConn.

"The poll is not representing one particular department at the University, but the whole campus community," he says.

So the Institute has been dropped from the title and UConn added.

Ferree says the poll is part of the University's outreach efforts in the state. It is intended to give students on campus an example of how survey research should be conducted, and to raise the visibility of social science and of the University as a whole in the eyes of the state, he says.

Since the poll's inception in 1979, 181 polls have been produced, asking a wide variety of questions that help draw a comprehensive portrait of the state across time. The polls are not limited to political questions and elections: they also touch on issues of societal importance, individual values and how people feel about living in Connecticut.

Luis Mocete