Once a librarian has made the decision to conduct a study of the economic community, several interrelated questions must be addressed: What is meant by the term "economic community" and what is known about it? What will be the objectives of the survey? Which businesses, industries, and services should be included? Who will conduct the…

Institutional research (IR) in community/junior colleges in past years has been limited to gathering data for external agencies, concentrating on raw demographic data and student flow studies. IR should be directed toward providing data for administrative decisions and for successful maintenance of college operations. In spite of the heavy demands…

The Panel on Manpower Training Evaluation has recommended that Social Security earnings data be more widely used in evaluating manpower programs, especially those that tend to serve prime-age males, such as the MDTA (Manpower Development Training Act) or NAB-JOBS (National Association of Businessmen-Job Opportunities in the Business Sector)…

The objective of this investigation was to collect data on the needs of information users which could serve as a basis for the design of information systems in the social sciences. Research habits of social scientists were explored to identify research procedures and problems of research including circumstantial and environmental variables. A…

This study was undertaken to determine whether the process of collecting observational data on mother-infant interactions influences the phenomena under investigation. A total of 40 white mother-infant dyads participated in the study. Half of the mothers were middle class and half were working class, and within each class group, half of the…

Field-tested procedures to collect followup data on former students of vocational education programs are described in the document. The procedures presented are designed to facilitate the collection, analysis, and reporting of information on jobs obtained and their relationship to training programs, and the income, geographic mobility, and the…

The reporting booklet is part of the Census Data System (CDS) of the Management Information System for Occupational Education (MISOE); it contains reporting forms which collect data that describes student enrollment and staff and facility utilization. Applicable to any individual occupational education program area, the booklet does not contain…

This report describes the opiate maintenance clinic established in Shreveport, Louisiana (1919-1923), whose short existence has recently been questioned by researchers. The authors of this manuscript visited with the original director of the clinic and were given permission to use the medical records of patients of the old clinic and numerous…

A procedural manual and a workbook present information on assessing instructional supervisory competencies in special education. Reviewed in a section on data collection are the five instruments used to obtain performance estimates on the specified critical competencies, directions for self assessment, and directions for using the instruments in…

Essential for an effective criterion-referenced testing program is a set of test items that are "valid" indicators of the objectives they have been designed to measure. Unfortunately, the complex matter of assessing item validity has received only limited attention from educational measurement specialists. One promising approach to the item…

This paper reviews some major lessons learned by participants in the Follow Through programs about the process ofimplementing innovative educational programs and outlines how these lessons were recorded and formulated for use by others. Using a perspective and method derived from anthropology and oral history these program aspects are described:…

There are a variety of problems connected with self-evaluation of local occupational programs: the focus on program graduates, objectives which cannot be measured, and goal statements too broad to be meaningful. To arrive at a solution to these problems, a philosophy statement and realistic measurable objectives were formulated. The philosophy…

The project, intended to design and field test models of specialized library services for older adults, was conducted in two parts. Phase 1 consisted of collecting and evaluating data for use in designing models in Louisville, Lexington, Somerset, and Hazard, Kentucky. Data was collected by search of the literature, personal interviews, a…

This paper summarizes the data management techniques used in a large-scale longitudinal study of intensive, innovative programs. Emphasis is placed on the scope of data collection, the methods used in the study to keep track of students over several years, the techniques used to collect data about students in public schools, the quality control on…

One of a series on library services to disadvantaged adults, this guide gives a three step plan for assessing community information needs. Seven methods of information gathering are described, and the important factors to be considered in interpreting the information are outlined. A pre-planning information form, a sample questionnaire for agency…