Supporting Statement B on Statistical Methods

Supporting Statement B on Statistical Methods

B. Collections of Information Employing Statistical Methods. Information will be collected mainly through a series of on-line questionnaires administered to entire populations of grantees in the designated programs. For purposes of illustration, the data collection methods to be used with the programs to be evaluated are described in detail below.

1) The potential respondent universe consists of an anticipated 1160 grantees. These include 260 recipients of grants in the Division of Public Programs; and 900 representatives of state and territorial humanities councils. (Note that these councils are not, strictly speaking, grantees; instead, as the name Federal/State Partnership suggests, they are NEH’s partners in creating humanities programming.) Depending on the program, grantees will be surveyed one to three years after the completion of grant activities. Electronic questionnaires will be developed for each particular grant category. Grantees will be asked to assess the long-term impact of the grants. The questionnaires will consist of a mixture of open-ended and close-ended questions.

2) We envision conducting a complete census of project directors.

3) We anticipate that the response rate to these questionnaires will be high. NEH staff will follow up with e-mail communications or letters to non-respondents.

4) Before they are administered, questionnaires will be pilot tested among a group of fewer than ten grantees.

5) The following will oversee the collection and analysis of information:

Karen Mittelman (Public Programs), Phone: 202-606-8269; and

Joshua Sternfeld (Federal/State Partnership), Phone: 202-606-8249.