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LSC-Net Member Survey Results

LSC-Net Member Survey Results
September 2003

What is the status of the LSC projects?

We heard from 144 individuals from 65 different LSC projects.

Of the 65 projects,

• 25 (38.5%) report being within the original funding period,
• 9 (13.8%) are in a no-cost extension period,
• 30 (46.2%) are post-NSF funding,
• 1 project had unknown status.

• 23 (76.7%) are continuing with other grants or funds,
• 7 (23.3%) have no continuing funds.

How often are members reading "What's New"?

Respondents reported reading the What's New:

• 86 (59.7%) - weekly or bi-weekly
• 35 (24.3%) - once a month
• 18 (12.5%) - few times a year
• 2 (1.4%) - never
• 3 (2.1 %) - did not respond to the question

Each week the "What's New" is mailed to over 800 subscribers of LSC-Net. We have heard anecdotally that many of you share these posts by either e-mailing them to colleagues or by printing them and sharing them in meetings.

Our questionnaire confirmed that many readers are in fact sharing the information with colleagues. 60.1% of respondents reported that they share the "What's New" with others, and an additional 15.4% said that they do so occasionally. 16.8% reported that they do not share it, and 7.6% did not respond.

LSC-Net members reported sharing the "What's New" email with university colleagues, professional colleagues, teachers (professional development), graduate students, pre-service teachers, curriculum supervisors, teacher leaders, principals and administrators. Although we do not have a way to measure the number of people that LSC-Net ultimately reaches, we have become aware that it is going beyond the LSC project community.

What are members using LSC-Net for?

As the LSC program winds down, we were interested in finding out about LSC alumni. We asked respondents how involved they currently are in LSC efforts. 54% reported being still actively involved in an LSC effort and an additional 17.3% replied that they remained "a little involved." 25.2% of respondents replied that they are no longer involved in an LSC. Interestingly 91% of those who reported no longer being involved in an LSC are still actively engaged in work related to mathematics and science reform. This has interesting ramifications when thinking of the capacity building that occurred (and continues to occur) from the LSC program. The lessons learned from the LSCs will be carried forward by those who were previously involved and may now be engaged in a CLT, or an MSP.

How do members use LSC-Net?

Some of the common themes we saw in the responses regarding how members have make use of LSCnet, were engaging in online conferences, using material to prepare for inservice teacher workshops and preservice, promoting dialogue between colleagues, and providing access to resources. Below are some sample answers...

• share web sites with prospective and inservice teachers
• stay informed about the current state of math and science reform, and what research is being conducted, understanding what is going on across the states
• use information for teacher workshops, professional development efforts
• access many of the articles and resources that are featured in "What's New"
• promote conversations with colleagues
• learn from the experiences of other projects
• pre-screened articles help to get more valuable information quickly
• research base to share with staff and/or use for funding purposes
• individual learning/intellectual growth
• access resources and information from other projects
• Sustainability Conference is very useful
• "As an evaluator, I find some of the articles posted very valuable. I also continually check to see if leadership from the projects I am evaluating are posting articles about their learnings."

Many of you encouraged us to continue providing LSC-net services, even though your LSC project may be coming to a close. Comments included:

"Continue referring us to new research/new findings/new reports related to math and science education."

"I'm most curious to learn about research results related to LSCs -- particularly results that show an impact on student achievement."

"Please continue with What's New even though some of the LSC's are post funding."

"Please keep being a repository for our papers. Sometimes I refer to presentations (keynotes, etc.) given in the VCs in my own presentations. The "What's New" emails are also useful and interesting."

"Continue to gather information on research and best practices. Postings of individual research studies would be useful as science leaders in various states work with their state offices and legislatures or as district leaders make the case with their school boards."

"Continue the process of keeping us up to date on what is happening in research and what projects are successful and why. We need this avenue of communication to be knowledgeable and informed."

"Continue providing the "screening" and referral of articles."

"I hope that the MSP projects will be able to participate in LSC-Net."

"We are struggling with how to keep a focus on science until the national science test is mandated in 2006 "for all." I know (from LSC-Net and other sources) that our situation is not uncommon, but it seems it would be particularly helpful to have support for keeping science going in these difficult times."

"My main suggestion is to keep going, even after the LSCs have gone. This service is of enormous importance to those of us who do scholarship on teacher development and systemic change."

"I think that even those project staff who no longer have NSF funding and who used LSC-Net in the past, continue to use this resource as a valuable way to share and learn about information, and to stay in touch with other LSC projects' staffs."

"Describe success stories of projects and how to reach project staff. As research studies are completed around the LSCs or other projects, reports on results would be useful. On another note, I have also been impressed with the annual on-line conference. Both as a participant and presenter, I have found it to be one of the most user-friendly on-line conferences I have ever participated in."

"I am not sure if you already do this or if it is possible, but providing up dates on currently funded NSF projects or projects that have filed interesting findings in yearly/final reports could provide insights and contacts for list serve members. In addition, this would provide brief information before a project staff goes through the long process of publishing."

Thank you
To all of you who responded thank you. We will continue sending out the What's New on a biweekly basis at least until the end of this calendar year and will take your suggestions seriously. Many of you expressed an interest in each other's work, so we encourage you to send us results of your projects, articles that you have written, and comments and queries that you would like shared.