Justification Template

DOCUMENTATION FOR THE GENERIC CLEARANCE

OF CUSTOMER SERVICE SATISFACTION COLLECTIONS

TITLE OF INFORMATION COLLECTION:

Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences Customer Satisfaction Survey (1800-0011)

PURPOSE:

The intended purpose of the Department of Education (ED), Institute of Education Sciences (IES) Focus Groups is to collect feedback from users on the relevance, timeliness, quality, and ease of access and use of the information and products provided online by IES through the What Works Clearinghouse website. The results of the focus groups will be used to inform improvements in ED program products and services for its customers.

DESCRIPTION OF RESPONDENTS:

The focus groups will draw on EDs customers which include Regional Educational Laboratories (REL) members. These groups include policy makers, researchers, district administrators and state officials.

The frequency for individual respondents is one time.

The respondent burden averages 60-90 minutes per focus group with each member expected to spend an average of 75 minutes. We are planning to hold five focus groups during the next year with an average of 8 participants per group, and an estimated total burden of 50 hours (5 groups x 8 participants x 1.25 hours).

TYPE OF COLLECTION: (Check one)

[ ] Customer Comment Card/Complaint Form [ ] Customer Satisfaction Survey

[ ] Usability Testing (e.g., Website or Software [ ] Small Discussion Group

[X] Focus Group [ ] Other: ______________________

CERTIFICATION:

I certify the following to be true:

1. The collection is voluntary.

2. The collection is low-burden for respondents and low-cost for the Federal Government.

3. The collection is non-controversial and does not raise issues of concern to other federal agencies.

4. The results are not intended to be disseminated to the public.

5. Information gathered will not be used for the purpose of substantially informing influential policy decisions.

6. The collection is targeted to the solicitation of opinions from respondents who have experience with the program or may have experience with the program in the future.

Name: _____________________________________

Neil Seftor

To assist review, please provide answers to the following question:

Personally Identifiable Information:

1. Is personally identifiable information (PII) collected? [ ] Yes [X] No

2. If Yes, will any information that is collected be included in records that are subject to the Privacy Act of 1974? [ ] Yes [ ] No

3. If Yes, has an up-to-date System of Records Notice (SORN) been published? [ ] Yes [ ] No

Gifts or Payments:

Is an incentive (e.g., money or reimbursement of expenses, token of appreciation) provided to participants? [ ] Yes [X] No

BURDEN HOUR COMPUTATION (Number of responses (X) estimated response or participation time in minutes (/60) = annual burden hours):

Category of Respondent	No. of Respondents	Participation Time	Burden
Individuals	40	75 minutes	50
Totals	40		50

FEDERAL COST: The estimated annual cost to the Federal government is $31,800 for five focus groups.

The selection of your targeted respondents

1. Do you have a customer list or something similar that defines the universe of potential respondents and do you have a sampling plan for selecting from this universe? [ ] Yes [ X ] No

If the answer is yes, please provide a description of both below (or attach the sampling plan)? If the answer is no, please provide a description of how you plan to identify your potential group of respondents and how you will select them?

Each REL has approximately 7-10 Research Alliances. We have proposed a list of ten total REL Research Alliances across five RELs whose work best aligns with the WWC products involved in the data collection. We will work with IES to identify which REL Alliances to approach based on their scheduled in person REL Research Alliance meetings.

Administration of the Instrument

1. How will you collect the information? (Check all that apply)

[ ] Web-based or other forms of Social Media

[ ] Telephone

[X] In-person

[ ] Mail

[ X ] Other, Explain

Four of the 16 total questions will be submitted in writing just prior to the start of the focus group. The responses to the remaining 12 questions, will be collected from the respondents verbally.

2. Will interviewers or facilitators be used? [ X ] Yes [ ] No

STATISTICAL INFORMATION

NA

REQUESTED APPROVAL DATE: OMB approved

NAME OF CONTACT PERSON: Neil Seftor

TELEPHONE NUMBER: (609) 275-2246

ED DEPARTMENT, OFFICE: IES, Vanessa Anderson and Diana McCallum

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