Here are some of the best questions for a high school students survey about life expectations, plus advice for crafting questions that actually reveal something meaningful. We use Specific to build these surveys in seconds—generate yours instantly and start collecting insights that matter.

Best open-ended questions for high school students survey about life expectations

Open-ended questions are your ticket to meaningful, unfiltered insights—they let students express themselves without being boxed into fixed answers. We reach for these when we want honest, detailed stories, but keep in mind: according to Pew Research Center, open-ended questions in surveys often have a higher nonresponse rate (averaging 18%) than closed questions (1–2%).[2] Still, they’re worth it when you want to deeply understand expectations, hopes, worries, and motivations.

1. What are the top three things you hope to achieve in your lifetime?

2. How do you picture your ideal life in ten years?

3. What are your biggest worries about the future?

4. Who inspires your life expectations and why?

5. How do your friends or family shape the way you think about your future?

6. What would “success” look like for you five years after high school?

7. Describe a challenge you think you’ll need to overcome to reach your goals.

8. What role do money or financial stability play in your hopes for adulthood?

9. If you could change anything about the world to make your future better, what would it be?

10. When you imagine your adult life, what feels uncertain or unclear?

Best single-select multiple-choice questions for high school students survey about life expectations

Single-select multiple-choice questions are perfect when we need to easily compare answers or summarize data. They’re especially useful at the start of a survey—respondents don’t have to think too hard, which gets them comfortable (and if you want to quantify trends, you’ll need these structured answers). It can also warm up students to reflecting more deeply, making it easier for them to answer open-ended followups.

Question: What is your main goal after finishing high school?

• Go to college or university

• Start working full time

• Take a gap year

• I’m not sure yet

• Other

Question: How confident do you feel about reaching your life goals?

• Very confident

• Somewhat confident

• Not very confident

• Not confident at all

Question: Which of these matters most to you when thinking about your future?

• Being successful in a career

• Being financially stable

• Having strong relationships

• Helping others or making an impact

• Enjoying life and experiences

• Other

When to followup with "why?" It’s a game changer when a student picks an option but you want to know what’s behind their choice. For example, if a student chooses “Take a gap year,” follow up with “Why are you interested in taking a gap year after high school?” This uncovers rich context behind simple answers, often surfacing new insights.

When and why to add the "Other" choice? Add “Other” when you want to encourage unique perspectives or capture something you hadn’t considered. Follow-up questions attached to “Other” can lead to unexpected or creative ideas that structured options can miss—helpful for analyzing themes you didn’t see coming.

NPS-style questions for high school students on life expectations

Net Promoter Score (NPS) isn’t just for companies—it’s a quick, proven way to measure sentiment, even among high schoolers. By asking, “On a scale of 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend this school’s life expectations programs/resources to a friend?” you can gauge engagement and see who feels supported versus who feels disconnected. According to studies with AI-powered conversational surveys, this approach isn’t only reliable for quantifying satisfaction; tailoring followup questions for detractors and promoters gives you sharp, direct feedback about what’s working and what’s falling short.[3]

If you’re ready to see this in action for high schoolers, try Specific's NPS survey builder for life expectations.

The power of follow-up questions

Our experience—and multiple studies—show that automated, AI-powered follow-up questions dramatically increase the quality of responses in conversational surveys.[3][4] Specific’s smart AI followups adapt in real time, asking clarifying or probing questions based on the student’s previous answers. This leads to more detailed, relevant, and actionable insights, all while making the process feel more like a real conversation.

For example, without follow-ups, you might end up with:

• High school student: “I just want to be successful.”

• AI follow-up: “What does success mean to you personally?”

That’s the difference between a generic answer and a goldmine of useful data.

How many followups to ask? We find that two or three targeted follow-ups are usually enough to get the context you need, while still keeping the experience light. With Specific, you can set a max follow-up number or let users skip ahead when you’ve gathered what you need.

This makes it a conversational survey, not just a static form. Students feel heard, which tends to raise participation and completion rates—a win for data quality.[1][3]

AI analysis, easy insights. Even though conversational surveys generate a lot of unstructured text, AI makes theme detection and response analysis simple. Check out our guide on analyzing survey responses using AI—it makes sense of feedback without drowning in data.

The concept of automated followup questions is new—and powerful. Try it for yourself: generate a survey and see how natural the conversation feels.

How to use ChatGPT (or GPTs) to generate questions for your high school students survey about life expectations

If you want to brainstorm great questions yourself—or with your team—the right prompt makes all the difference. Start simple:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for high school students survey about Life Expectations.

If you give AI more context about the purpose, audience, and what you want to achieve, you'll get better results:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for high school students in their junior year, focused on their life expectations after graduation. Avoid yes/no questions, aim for conversation starters, and consider including future challenges and inspirations.

Once you have a draft set of questions, use this prompt to organize them:

Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.

Finally, hone in on the themes that matter most:

Generate 10 questions for categories such as "challenges after high school" and "definition of success".

This approach brings clarity, avoids survey bloat, and makes the final set of questions more relevant (and actionable).

What is a conversational survey, and why does it matter?

Conversational surveys turn static, boring forms into interactive chats. Respondents engage one question at a time, and AI-powered follow-ups dive deeper into their answers—making participation feel natural instead of transactional. Manual survey creation is rigid, time-consuming, and often leads to incomplete data. AI-powered survey generation—like we do at Specific—adapts in real time, generating conversational surveys that adapt and probe like a seasoned interviewer.

Why use AI for high school students surveys? We’ve seen that integrating AI doesn’t just speed up survey creation—it also improves the quality and depth of collected data. Studies indicate that conversational AI, when used for surveys or interviews, generates more in-depth, consistent, and relevant responses compared to traditional forms.[3][4] This is crucial for teen audiences who appreciate survey formats that resemble familiar messaging experiences. See how editing surveys with AI is now as simple as describing what you want to change—no more fiddling with complicated forms.

If you want to learn more about the step-by-step process, we’ve covered the best techniques here: How to create a high school students survey about life expectations. Specific gives you the smoothest experience in both survey creation and feedback collection—it just flows.

See this life expectations survey example now

Unlock richer student insights—see how an AI-powered conversational survey for high school students makes feedback deep, fast, and actionable. Start now to experience surveys built for real conversations, not confusion.