{"id":38169,"date":"2024-04-04T09:47:34","date_gmt":"2024-04-04T14:47:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/2024\/04\/04\/teacher-survey-methodology\/"},"modified":"2024-04-13T23:48:42","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T04:48:42","slug":"teacher-survey-methodology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/social-trends\/2024\/04\/04\/teacher-survey-methodology\/","title":{"rendered":"Methodology"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The data in this report comes from a self-administered web survey of K-12 public school teachers in the United States. It was conducted online in English from Oct. 17 to Nov. 14, 2023. Out of 6,357 teachers who were sampled, 191 were screened out as no longer eligible. A total of 2,531 completed the survey, for a completion rate of 41.0%. The margin of sampling error for the full sample of 2,531 teachers is plus or minus 2.4 percentage points. The survey was administered by RAND on its American Teacher Panel, a nationally representative panel of public K-12 teachers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The American Teacher Panel is recruited through probability-based methods from a commercially available list of U.S. public school teachers. The sampling frame for recruiting teachers to the panel was acquired from MDR Education. It is intended to be as comprehensive as possible, yet likely underrepresents new teachers, or experienced teachers new to a school or district. The American Teacher Panel began in 2014 and currently includes more than 25,000 teachers. Teachers recruited to the American Teacher Panel have agreed to participate in online surveys several times per school year and receive incentives for completing surveys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Teachers selected to join the American Teacher Panel are first sent an invitation packet via FedEx that includes a prepaid $10 gift card as an incentive. Reminder emails are sent to nonrespondents whose contact information includes an email address. The American Teacher Panel has an overall empanelment rate of 30%. Read additional details about the American Teacher Panel\u2019s design and methodology<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sample design<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The target population for this survey was K-12 public school teachers in the United States. A total of 6,357 teachers were invited to participate in this survey. This includes an initial sample of 5,000 teachers and a supplementary sample of 1,361 teachers that was later drawn to achieve the targeted sample size of 2,500 completed interviews. Because teachers are invited to join the American Teacher Panel at varying rates, each teacher\u2019s probability of selection for this survey was inversely proportional to their estimated probability of membership in the American Teacher Panel. This is done so that each teacher has approximately equal probabilities of having both joined the American Teacher Panel and been selected for this survey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Data collection protocol<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The field period for this survey was Oct. 17-Nov. 14, 2023. After an initial invitation email, nonresponding teachers in the initial sample received up to three reminder emails. Nonrespondents in the supplemental sample received up to two reminder emails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Weighting<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The data was weighted in a multistep process that accounts for multiple stages of sampling and nonresponse that occur at different points in the survey process. Every American Teacher Panel member begins with a design weight that accounts for their initial probability of selection for their recruitment survey. That weight is further calibrated so that the composition of the entire panel aligns with that of the national population of public school teachers based on data from the National Center for Education Statistics on a combination of school and teacher characteristics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weighting parameters for the following school-level characteristics are based on the 2021-2022 Common Core of Data (CCD):<\/p>\n\n\n\n