Methodology
The online survey was advertised through REACH-L and LREDA list serves, district UUA staff, and outreach to individual religious educators. It was available for completion for approximately three months. Online survey software was used to design the Teacher Development Survey and assure complete confidentiality and anonymity of responses. All participants provided information about their congregation size, religious education program size, and location (urban, suburban or rural). Although it was optional, 61% chose to provide their name and contact information. There were 140 responses, with a distribution from large, mid-size and small congregations and children/youth programs paralleling the distribution of congregation and program sizes in the Association overall.The survey obtained information through multiple assessments. Often we inquired about one topic through multiple question formats. What and how questions are posed influences responses. For example, we often asked open-ended questions at the start of a section. This allowed participants to respond based on their own preconceptions and ideas. Later we provided more closed-ended questions, where participants could indicate how much the provided information applies or does not apply to their practice. Likert scale responses with five descriptors (e.g. always, usually, occasionally, rarely, never) were used for many closed-ended questions. Additionally, there was room for comments. We asked participants to rank-order (most likely to least likely) ideas or practices at the close of most sections of inquiry. By the time participants arrived at a question asking for the ranking of choices, they had been ushered through thinking about the overall topic through the previous questions.
For example, the content of current teacher training and development efforts were assessed through three venues: open-ended question; responses to twelve possible areas of focus with Likert responses (always, usually, occasionally, rarely, never) to the question, "How frequently do you focus on __?;" and a question inviting respondents to rank their top five content priorities. In general, we found consistency to answers within each topic, regardless of the type of question posed. This attests to the validity of the survey design.
Last updated on Friday, April 18, 2008.
