CIRCUMSTANCES MAKING COLLECTION OF INFORMATION NECESSARY
On September 11, 1993, President Clinton issued Executive Order 12862, “Setting Customer Service Standards,” which clearly defined his vision that the Federal agencies will put the public first. To accomplish this, President Clinton called for a “revolution within the Federal government to change the way it does business.” He expected this process to require continual reform of government practices and operations to the end that, “when dealing with the Federal agencies, all people receive service that matches or exceeds the best service available in the private sector.”
Section 1(b) of this E.O. requires agencies to “survey customers to determine the kind and quality of services they want and their level of satisfaction with existing services” and Section 1(a) requires agencies to “survey front- line employees on barriers to, and ideas for, matching the best in business.” These Presidential requirements established an ongoing need for the National Science Foundation (NSF) to engage in an interactive process of collecting information and using it to improve program services and processes.
The Division of Administrative Services (DAS) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) maintains the website, NSF.gov (http://www.nsf.gov), which is the NSF’s public facing website. DAS is embarking on a redesign of the main navigation on the website to improve user satisfaction with its public audience and within the agency. The information collected from card sorting activities will help provide the framework for this effort.
HOW, BY WHOM, AND PURPOSE FOR WHICH INFORMATION IS TO BE USED
DAS plans to perform multiple card sorting exercises with both internal agency staff and a pool of public users to understand how they group and organize the various tasks they perform on NSF.gov. This information will provide DAS with the necessary data to create a more intuitive navigation on the website and how best to prioritize existing content. An online card sorting tool will be utilized in order to capture a geographically diverse sample of users of the site, as well as, to reduce time needed for analysis.
USE OF AUTOMATION
A web-based card sorting application will be used.
EFFORTS TO IDENTIFY DUPLICATION
Not applicable.
SMALL BUSINESS CONSIDERATIONS
Not applicable.
CONSEQUENCES OF LESS FREQUENT COLLECTION
Not applicable.
SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES FOR COLLECTION
Not applicable.
FEDERAL REGISTER NOTICE
The agency’s notice, as required by 5 CFR 1320.8(d), was published in the Federal Register on February 25, 2014 at 79 FR 10574, and no substantive comments were received.
OUTSIDE CONSULTATION
Booz Allen Hamilton will be the contractor performing the card sorting activities.
GIFTS OR REMUNERATION
Not applicable.
CONFIDENTIALITY PROVIDED TO RESPONDENTS
The performance of any test participant will not be individually attributable. Individual participant names will not be collected during the card sorting session.
QUESTIONS OF A SENSITIVE NATURE
No questions of a sensitive nature will be asked.
ANNUALIZED ESTIMATE OF BURDEN
Category of Respondent |
No. of Respondents |
Participation Time |
Burden |
Card sorting Sessions |
60 |
1/2 hour |
30 hours |
Totals |
|
|
30 hours |
ANNUALIZED COST TO RESPONDENTS
DAS will be targeting both the research community and the general public for these activities, approximately 50% of each group.
In April 2011, The Chronicle of Higher Education published a table of average faculty salaries by field and rank at doctoral institutions for the academic year of 2012-2013. The data was collected from the “Annual survey by the American Association of University Professors.” The salaries are rounded to the nearest $100 and adjusted to a nine-month work year.
For public users, according to the Census ACS survey the median household income for the United States was $52,250 in 2013, which is the latest data available. This data was adjusted to a 50 week work year.
Cost to Respondents
Average salary of faculty (researchers) as described above |
$90,838.67 |
Hourly salary based on 1,560 annual hours (40 hours per week for 39 weeks) |
$58.23 |
Estimate of survey burden (researchers) |
30 hours |
Cost to researcher respondents |
$1,746.90 |
Average salary of a public user as described above |
$52,250.00 |
Hourly salary based on 2,000 annual hours (40 hours per week for 50 weeks) |
$26.13 |
Estimate of survey burden (researchers) |
30 hours |
Cost to researcher respondents |
$783.90 |
TOTAL ANNUALIZED COST TO RESPONDENTS |
$2,530.80 |
CAPITAL/STARTUP COSTS
Not
applicable.
ANNUALIZED COST TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
The table below estimates the cost to the government associated with the NSF.gov card sorting activities. Costs include contractor support and the participation of federal government employees. Federal employee hourly rate was calculated from OPM’s Salary Table 2014-DCB for salaries effective January 2014. The hourly wage for a GS-13-9 was used.
Cost to the Federal Government
Contractor support for card sorting preparation and analysis |
$13,200 |
Hourly salary of federal government employee (GS-13-9) |
$54.58 |
Hours, federal government employee review and oversight |
10 |
Cost of federal government employee review and oversight |
$545.58 |
Cost to the Federal Government |
$13,745.58 |
CHANGES IN BURDEN
Not Applicable.
18. PUBLICATION OF COLLECTION
Not applicable.
19. SEEKING APPROVAL TO NOT DISPLAY OMB EXPIRATION DATE
Not applicable.
20. EXCEPTION(S) TO THE CERTIFICATION STATEMENT (19) ON OMB 83-I
There are no exceptions.
STATISTICAL METHODS
B.1. Universe and Sampling Procedures
DAS will be targeting both the research community and the general public for these activities. Participant names for card sorting will provided by a volunteer list that was generated by a survey that NSF issued in August 2014. People who participated in the survey had the option to leave their contact information if they were interested in participating in usability testing for NSF.gov.
B.2. Survey Methodology
DAS plans to conduct two card sorting activities with approximately 30 volunteer participants for each. Card sorting activities will be conducted utilizing a web-based card sorting tool. Information will be used to revise the topic-based navigation on the website.
The first activity is an Open Card Sort, where each participant will be given a list of site content items with no pre-established groupings. They will be asked to sort the items into groups that they feel are appropriate, and then describe each group. Open Card Sorting is useful in finding out what structures are easiest for users to navigate.
The second activity is a Closed Card Sort, where each participant will be given a list of site content items with a pre-established set of primary groups. They will be asked to place items into these groups. Closed Card Sorting is useful for testing user satisfaction with proposed website navigation structures.
B.3. Methods to Maximize Response
The activities will be conducted
remotely via a web-based card sorting tool. The remote nature of the
activities will work to maximize response by allowing greater
flexibility for the participants and eliminating expenses related to
transportation to a testing facility.
B.4. Testing of Procedures
A trial run of the card sort activities will be conducted with members of the internal team.
B.5. Contacts for Statistical Aspects of Data Collection
Terri Edillon, project manager in DAS, is the point of contact for data collection and analysis.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| File Title | SUPPORTING STATEMENT |
| Author | JFELDMAN |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-27 |