Polls on private/independent school topics

[SAM2]

OK, since my original post (retained below), I came across a much better survey site. I copied the old questions into a single survey form, and added several others. I think I can freely add more questions later without creating a new survey, so if anyone has suggestions, please post them below. As before, the survey site says it will block the same IP address from casting multiple votes, although it should allow you to go back and amend any of your answers after you've already voted. Once you'd submitted answers, the survey will display the running results. I think you can simply skip any questions that don't apply.

https://www.kwiksurveys.com?s=HKNIHG_a972c885

Let me know what you think of this new survey form. Sorry for the false start. I think this new survey should work better for anyone who is interested.

SAM2 original message wrote:I've been thinking about anonymous online polls lately, and how they might be interesting for some DCUM topics, so I decided to create one. This first poll on WPPSI scores is really mainly a preliminary test to see how it works, and to generate some feedback. If you're interested, submit your child's info. Much like anything on DCUM, there's no way to confirm whether or not people are being honest. But I'd hope that no one will be motivated to lie for an anonymous poll. If I've set it up correctly, the online software should ignore multiple votes from the same IP address, to deter ballot-stuffing.

WPPSI score: http://www.micropoll.com/akira/mpview/1006754-273168
Financial aid: http://www.micropoll.com/akira/mpview/1006754-273171
Where do students from certain schools live? (question someone posed on another thread): http://www.micropoll.com/akira/mpview/1006754-273172

If this produces interesting results, I'll create some other polls and post them here in a comprehensive list. If you have suggestions for other polls, please post them below. It will be most useful if you'll post not only a poll question, but also the list of permitted responses.

[Anonymous]

An interesting second question to your first would be something like: What kind of test prep did you do?

(We did none.)

[Anonymous]

I like this survey tool ... I can imagine it being used when clear disputes erupt on threads ... it's nice to know how many individuals hold one view versus another since one cannot determine how many people multi-post on dcum. Our school was not one of the ones listed in the first question, so maybe an "other" is needed?

[Anonymous]

Add Burgundy Farm Country Day School to the list? Thanks.

[Anonymous]

Regarding the last question on anonymous posting, Jeff already can track posters behind the scenes as long as they post from the same computer (which is generally the case) by using the ISP address. This is how he can identify the sock puppets when asked to do so.

[SAM2]

Anonymous wrote:Add Burgundy Farm Country Day School to the list? Thanks.

OK, it seems like I cannot make changes to questions that already have responses, but I think I can add new questions. I'll wait until other people have had a chance to post all the schools that I forgot to list, and then I'll add a question to cover those schools. That will allow people to get a sense of which schools are represented here, but just in two separate questions. My apologies for the oversight. I'm still learning as I go on this.

[Anonymous]

bump

[Anonymous]

I get the impression that only 10-15 people are posting on the private school threads (over, and over, and over again). So I'd be a little wary about statistical validity for some of the results. We could say, I guess, "a poll of DCUM" showed XYZ, then people will know these are not universal truths, just the products of our own warped little minds....

[Anonymous]

20:35 here - if you could put how many people voted (n = 25 or whatever), that might help us stats geeks get over the sample size problem, or at least understand that it's there.

[SAM2]

Sure, I'm happy to help put the numbers in context. So far, only 11 people have responded. It appears not everyone has answered every question.

When you look at the results page, can you see the number of people responding? I can, and I assumed everyone else can, but maybe that's wrong. For example, on question 12 (age), I can see that 3 people (27%) marked 30-39, and 8 people marked 40-49 (73%). Can you see that same n-count?

I'm surprised there have not been more responses. Maybe it's because it's the end of summer and there aren't many people visiting the site right now. Or maybe there really are only about a dozen people who post over and over to the private school threads and recycle the same old tired arguments (how depressing!). Maybe people are just shy.

IMO, the small sample size makes the current results relatively meaningless. I was hoping 100+ people would respond, which would make things interesting. But no such luck. Maybe as we get into Fall, more people will respond.

[Anonymous]

probably need to just keep bumping it up, especially next week when private school starts. I can see the responses. I didn't answer all the questions because not all applied (e.g., ISEE because my kids took the SSATs, or WISC because neither took that).

[Anonymous]

Our school isn't listed, so I didn't bother answering other questions.

[SAM2]

Bumping to see if I can draw some more data from people who haven't responded yet. I think the total is up to 23 or 24 total responses so far. Some interesting patterns are starting to emerge, but the data set is still way to small to have any confidence in the numbers.

As I mentioned before, if you don't see your school listed, please post the name here so I can add a question to cover it. Note that you don't have to answer every question -- if your school is not listed, you still can provide data on the other items. Also, if you can think of other questions that might prove interesting, feel free to post those too.

[Anonymous]

I post here relatively frequently but wouldn't answer an online survey. It's pseudo-science to me. And, from what I've heard/seen, I suspect it's really easy (and costs nothing) to mask an IP address.

[Anonymous]

I filled out the survey for one kid, but couldn't do it for the other kid because the school wasn't listed. Specifically, Grace Episcopal Day School in Kensington.

I notice that there are some schools on the list that are not strictly private/independent, although that's the title of the survey. I have no problem with this. In fact, I know a number of families, including us, who have done both private and magnets.

But if you do go this route then the list is a bit incomplete. For example, you list School Without Walls (a charter), so maybe you should also list Yu Ying, Duke Ellington, Washington Latin and Capitol City (other charters that get discussed here a lot). Similarly, you list TJ and the Blair magnets (public magnets), also "regular" Blair, so maybe you should also list other magnets such as the Richard Montgomery IB program, the Takoma Park and Eastern MS magnets, the MoCo G&T magnet or the MoCo Highly Gifted magnets.

Listing the additional MoCo magnets isn't too lengthy, but there are a ton of DC charters and I don't have any good advice for where to stop. Plus with 25 respondents so far, I'm not sure it's worth your effort. Possibly the number of respondents would go up if more people found their schools on the list. (Although my suspicion that this forum is mainly Sidwell and cathedral school parents posting about each other is getting some quantitative support!)

Thanks for this ambitious attempt to help us understand ourselves!