"The Winthrop Poll offers an invaluable service to the people of South Carolina by providing policy makers with data-driven perspectives on important issues of the day."
Former Winthrop President Dan Mahony
The Winthrop Poll is a long-term survey initiative designed to keep public policy makers across the country in touch with the attitudes and opinions of residents of South Carolina and "The South" as a region — and South Carolina and southeastern residents in touch with the viewpoints that are dominant in their state or region at any given time. It is the only regular "snapshot" of public policy attitudes of the residents of the South or of the state of South Carolina.
The first Winthrop Poll was conducted in the fall of 2006 by Winthrop's Center for Public Opinion & Policy Research (CPOPR). From the spring 2007 until spring 2009, SC ETV and Winthrop partnered to create the Winthrop/ETV Poll initiative. Beginning in the fall of 2009 all of these efforts were rolled into The Winthrop Poll. The Winthrop Poll alternates between regional, sub-regional, and single state polling with up to 4 polls a year. The Winthrop Poll initiative is headed by Dr. Scott Huffmon who is a faculty member of the Department of Political Science.
The Winthrop Center for Public Opinion & Policy Research (CPOPR) conducts other polls annually, some under contract to various public and private sector organizations, and some for academic research purposes. The CPOPR does not take political candidates or political parties as clients.
The CPOPR is located in Dinkins Hall and uses professionally trained callers who are expertly conversant with the lab's Computer Aided Telephone Interviewing (CATI) system and have specialized training in interviewing sensitive populations (this training is only needed for certain CPOPR projects, not The Winthrop Poll).
