The experience of the American Council on Education's Cooperative Institutional Research Program indicates that large-scale national surveys in the domain of higher education can be performed with scientific integrity within the constraints of costs, logistics, and technical resources. The purposes of this report are to provide complete and…

This paper provides a framework for developing sampling designs in mixed methods research. First, we present sampling schemes that have been associated with quantitative and qualitative research. Second, we discuss sample size considerations and provide sample size recommendations for each of the major research designs for quantitative and…

A formula for determining sample size, which originally appeared in 1960, has lacked a table for easy reference. This article supplies a graph of the function and a table of values which permits easy determination of the size of sample needed to be representative of a given population. (DG)

Complex survey designs often employ multistage cluster sampling designs and oversample particular units to ensure more accurate population parameter estimates. These issues must be accommodated in the analysis to ensure accurate parameter estimation. Incorporation of sample weights in some statistical procedures has been studied. However, research…

This is one of a series of eight short monographs intended to aid practicing educators in planning and conducting accountability programs in schools. This booklet discusses how to determine a sampling method that is appropriate to the objectives of a particular research or evaluation effort. Short sections focus in turn on why and when to sample,…

An empirical sampling approach was used to assess the accuracy of a Taylor approximation for the estimation of sampling errors. The sampling errors were in the statistics involved in estimating a path model based on medium-sized samples gathered using five sample designs commonly used in educational research. (TJH)

Study of college faculty has been hampered by the variation in types of institutions, the difficulty of obtaining an accurate faculty sample, and poor response rates to large-scale surveys. This document examines various approaches to conducting large-scale faculty surveys, and describes a suggested procedure to mitigate methodological problems.…

This report presents considerations for sample design and estimation procedures for the Health Examination Survey, one of the major survey programs employed by the National Center for Health Statistics. The survey collects data which provide national estimates and distributions of various health characteristics related to the growth and…

A study assessed the selection techniques used to secure focus group respondents at one site as part of a larger study to determine what viewers learned from the 1992 Presidential Debates. A two-stage random sampling technique was developed to select focus group respondents from the 224,041 registered voters in Syracuse, New York. The random…

Purpose: Residential care/assisted living describes diverse facilities providing non-nursing home care to a heterogeneous group of primarily elderly residents. This article derives typologies of assisted living based on theoretically and practically grounded evidence. Design and Methods: We obtained data from the Collaborative Studies of Long-Term…

This report is intended to provide government managers with some perspective on the nature and implications of sample surveys, their likely costs, and what can be expected from them. The authors discuss sample surveys less from the technical side than from the perspective of the officials who will make management decisions about an overall survey.…

Through utilization of effective sampling procedures, libraries may obtain substantial savings in terms of data collection costs. A theoretical statistical sampling model is presented and two types of random sampling techniques are empirically compared as to their effectiveness in estimating a library usage parameter. Implications are drawn for…

Available library statistical information is unreliable and missing in many areas. This report covers three general subjects: (1) the description of the nature of the figures that are currently available, including lists of library statistics publications, and an indication of some information which is wanted but not available; (2) a discussion of…

Prior to a study to determine the degree to which vocational training is related to employability, a pilot project was conducted to test the proposed research method and determine the bias that might arise from using samples taken from the telephone directory. The selected pilot sample, 835 residences in Hennepin County, Minnesota, was drawn from…