MEMORANDUM
Date: June 5, 2015
To: Shelly Wilkie Martinez, Desk Officer
Office of Management and Budget
From: John Gawalt, Director
National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics
Via: Suzanne Plimpton, Clearance Officer
National Science Foundation (NSF)
Subject: Notification of data collection under generic clearance
The purpose of this memorandum is to inform you of NSF’s plan to conduct cognitive interviews under the generic clearance for survey improvement projects (OMB #3145-0174). This activity is associated with the NSF Survey of Nonprofit Research Activities (NPRA).
NSF has been working on a revised survey to measure R&D expenditures and funding within nonprofit organizations since the fall of 2013. The last time such a survey was conducted was for Fiscal Years 1996 and 1997. Over the last 18 months we have conducted exploratory interviews, held an expert panel, and participated in a CNSTAT workshop on the topic. Based on this input we drafted a questionnaire that includes questions for both performers and funders of R&D. Our next step is to conduct cognitive testing of the questions before building the web survey and requesting information collection clearance for the pilot test of the survey.
NSF plans to conduct 40 in-person cognitive interviews to test the new survey (now called the Survey of Nonprofit Research Activities (NPRA)) and the introductory letter and handout that will be mailed to each nonprofit sampled for the pilot test.
The draft of the survey questionnaire, the introductory letter and handout are provided in Appendix A. The protocol for the interviews and other interview recruitment material is provided in Appendix B.
We will schedule 1.5 hour in-person interviews at each organization selected. NSF will select large, medium and small organizations specializing in medical, physical sciences, and engineering research as well as those who conduct or fund social science or humanities-based studies in order to obtain the broadest possible feedback on the draft questions and definitions. We plan to recruit participants from the metropolitan areas of Washington, DC, Chicago, and Los Angeles. We will build in sufficient time (at least 2 weeks) between each trip in order to evaluate the results and make modifications to the materials as needed.
Interviews: We expect to conduct 40 1.5 hour interviews. NSF expects up to 3 people may attend each meeting on behalf of the organization. Therefore, we estimate a total of 180 hours of respondent burden.
There are no incentive payments.
The contact person for questions regarding this data collection is:
Ronda Britt
Project Manager
Nonprofit Research Activities Survey
National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics
National Science Foundation
703-292-7765
Attachments
cc: Rebecca Morrison
Attachment A
Survey of Nonprofit Research Activities
Introductory Letter, Handout, Draft Questionnaire and Research Funding Flow Graphic
Attachment B
Survey of Nonprofit Research Activities
Cognitive Interview Protocol and Recruitment Materials
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| File Title | MEMORANDUM |
| Author | LCHRISTO |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-29 |