Mapping FASD Training Opportunities in Canada: An Environmental Scan

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2 Survey Methodology

A listserv was developed as the vehicle for disseminating the survey and accepting responses online.

A pre-survey email was sent out to respondents three days before the survey was sent out, alerting them that the survey was soon to be released and asking them to respond. Four contact points were made with respondents. The first email with a cover letter (Appendix C) and link to the online survey was sent out to 379 respondents on March 10, 2005 in English and French. The first of three other emails was sent out one week later and contained the survey link, the second reminder with the link on March 22 (only 80 responses had been received by this date) and the final on April 1 (118 responses). The survey was closed to responses on April 8, 2005. The final response rate was 37%, or 142 responses. While the survey instructions indicated that one survey was to be completed for each training event, this was followed by only a few of the respondents. Most organizations filled out one survey for all of the training they developed.

Online survey response rates vary widely and are affected by a number of factors. There are many ways to increase response rates, such as personalizing the invitation to participate, offering incentives, keeping the forms and instructions simple, and sending reminder emails. Where possible, the Project Team addressed some of the factors in conducting the survey, most notably in striving for simplicity and clarity, and sending reminder prompts. While the response rate is not unacceptable, it was lower than desired and caused the team to consider why this might be.

A question was raised regarding the use of the Directory as the main source for potential survey respondents: “Was this the best resource for obtaining respondents for the survey?” What fuelled this question was the fact that the Project Manager received several emails throughout the survey period from individuals indicating that they - or their organization - did not conduct training, and were therefore not eligible to respond to the survey. Others reported that they funded training programs, but do not deliver them and therefore did not complete the survey. In reality, no other intact source of information was available about who delivered and planned FASD trainings. Hence, no list or database existed. This scan was a first step in trying to collect this information in Canada.

In retrospect, the decision to use the Directory as the primary source for identifying respondents may have been flawed. While the Directory is not intended to be a compendium of organizations that offer training, it was perhaps the only resource at the time that contained a fairly comprehensive list of people involved in FASD and was thought to be a good source of contacts. Unfortunately, this was not necessarily so; this needs to be addressed in any future documentation of training initiatives.

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