Expected yield rates are essential to a survey's data collection plan, as they inform requisite sample sizes to meet the survey's objectives. Given an overall expected yield rate for a self-administered mail survey, this short take describes a simple method for using the Census Planning Database to assign differential yield rates to lower-level…

The PPIC Statewide Survey was inaugurated in 1998 to provide a way for Californians to express their views on important public policy issues. The survey provides timely, relevant, nonpartisan information on Californians' political, social, and economic opinions. It seeks to inform and improve state policymaking, raise awareness, and encourage…

We present an equation, derived from standard statistical theory, that can be used to estimate sampling margin of error for student evaluations of teaching (SETs). We use the equation to examine the effect of sample size, response rates and sample variability on the estimated sampling margin of error, and present results in four tables that allow…

This article proposes that sampling design effects have potentially huge unrecognized impacts on the results reported by large-scale district and state assessments in the United States. When design effects are unrecognized and unaccounted for they lead to underestimating the sampling error in item and test statistics. Underestimating the sampling…

This manual provides guidance and documentation for users of the longitudinal kindergarten-fourth grade (K-4) public-use data file of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010-11 (ECLS-K:2011), which includes the first release of the public version of the third-grade data. This manual mainly provides information specific…

The Programme for International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) will establish technical standards and guidelines to ensure that the survey design and implementation processes of PIAAC yield high-quality and internationally comparable data. This document provides a revised version of the technical standards and guidelines originally…

This research examined the issue of nonresponse bias and how it was reported in nonexperimental quantitative research published in the "Delta Pi Epsilon Journal" between 1995 and 2004. Through content analysis, 85 articles consisting of 91 separate samples were examined. In 72.5% of the cases, possible nonresponse bias was not examined in the…

This chapter provides an overview of sampling methods that are appropriate for conducting online surveys. The authors review some of the basic concepts relevant to online survey sampling, present some probability and nonprobability techniques for selecting a sample, and briefly discuss sample size determination and nonresponse bias. Although some…

The research on response facilitation factors in mail surveys is reviewed, and background is developed to enable the comparison of results obtained by two analytic approaches, a descriptive analysis and a meta-analysis, using the same set of studies. Specific criteria for sample and methodology were applied to studies extracted from four CD-ROM…

An electronic survey of a listserv discussion group, the Interdisciplinary Teamed Instruction (ITI) group, was conducted to learn more about the group and to explore surveying electronically. A 10-question survey was posted electronically, as were respondents' replies. Three reminders were posted over the 3-week reply period. The number of…

Possible bias due to sampling problems or low response rates has been a troubling "nuisance" variable in empirical research since seminal and classical studies were done on these problems at the beginning of this century. Recent research suggests that: (1) earlier views of the alleged bias problem were misleading; (2) under a variety of fairly…

Much of the literature on random-digit-dial (RDD) response rates focuses on the benefits and drawbacks of various screening and sampling procedures. The common assumption is that enumeration is more invasive, leading to lower response rates, but there are concerns about population coverage and self-selection with other methods. When the target…

Differences between means, variance, and correlation parameter estimates from a full school sample and samples restricted by parental consent were studied with 1,609 students at continuation high schools and 1,192 at traditional high schools. Sample bias due to consent policies may not be a substantive problem, especially if a telephone consent…

The 1996 National Household Education Survey (NHES:96) was a random digit dial telephone survey of households that was developed by the National Center for Education Statistics and conducted by Westat, Inc. The NHES:96 included two topical survey components, "Parent and Family Involvement in Education," (PFI) which collected data about…

This volume documents the data collection of the 1990-91 Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS). People wishing to determine whether their research needs can be served by SASS data will find a description of the survey's contents and objectives in the Overview. This volume contains the following chapters: (1) "Overview"; (2) "Changes in…