INFO FOR PARENTS
2002 Missouri Student Survey
2. How will this information be used?
3. How were students recruited for participation in the survey?
4. Why was your child's participation important?
5. Is this the first survey like this to be done in Missouri schools?
6. Were sensitive questions asked?
1.
What is the focus of the Missouri 2002 Student Survey?
The focus of the student survey is the health risk behaviors of youth—such as violence and alcohol, tobacco, and other drug use—that can result in injury and/or impede positive development. The survey also includes risk and protective factors, the attitudes and opinions that research has shown to be highly correlated with these health risk behaviors.
2.
How will the information be used?
The aggregate data gathered from the Missouri Student Survey will
be provided to the school district superintendent and may be shared at
the discretion of the district superintendent.
A. Voluntary Participation: Parents were asked to return a consent form to allow their children to participate in the study. Those students whose parents consented completed the survey. Students whose parents did not consent to participation were asked to perform some alternative activity (e.g., reading) while the survey was being conducted.
B. Anonymous Participation: To increase the likelihood of valid responses, the data were collected in a manner that ensured the anonymity of individual students. If your child participated in the study, he or she received a survey booklet that contained the question items and a place to record responses. The survey booklet did not have the student’s name or any other identifying information on it. Before they began, students were reminded that they should not write such information on the booklet.
C. Data Confidentiality: When completing the survey, students were arranged so that the teacher administering the survey or the student’s peers could not see their responses, and students were provided with a blank sheet of paper to cover their answers. At the end of the class period, each student was asked to place his/her completed questionnaire into an envelope and seal it; these envelopes were inserted into a larger envelope and sealed. No one at the school had access to an individual student's responses, and no one from the study team will be able to link any individual child to a questionnaire.
4.
Why was your child's participation important?
The survey aims to gather information to better understand the impact of risk- and protective-factors and to guide future prevention efforts so that youth can have better prevention outcomes, such as reduction in substance abuse, violence, delinquency. If the students in your child’s grade were selected to participate in this study, they represented hundreds of students across the State of Missouri. Thus, it was vitally important that as many of the sampled students as possible completed the survey.
This
is the second time that the Missouri Student Survey has been administered in
Missouri schools. All school districts in Missouri that receive
federal funding for substance abuse prevention activities, however, are required to
administer a student survey to determine if the districts' activities for the
prevention of alcohol, tobacco, and drug use have been successful and to
identify needs for the future. The
Department of Elementary Secondary Education (DESE) has administered a survey
called the Safe and Drug Free Schools Survey mandated every other year for many
years. The
Missouri 2002 Student Survey and the Safe and Drug Free Schools Survey contain
similar questions on substance use, but the Missouri 2002 Student Survey
includes additional questions focusing on factors that either protect youth from
substance use or place them at risk for such use. The additional information gathered by the Missouri Student
Survey will allow the State to make the best assessment of the need for
prevention efforts in the State and to target these efforts effectively.
The survey included questions related to alcohol, tobacco, other drug use, violent behaviors; and related risk and protective factors that could be considered sensitive by some. The questions in these topic areas were asked honestly and straightforwardly in order to determine if Missouri youth engage in health risk behaviors.
Some
examples of the questions:
17.
My teacher(s) notices when I am doing a good job and lets me know about
it.
NO!
no
yes
YES!
93.
Which of the following activities for people your age are available in
your community?
__sports
teams
__scouting
__boys
and girls clubs
__4-H clubs
__service
clubs
Examples
of questions that could be considered sensitive by some include:
30c. How old were you when you
first had more than a sip or two of beer, wine, or
__Never
__10 or younger
__12
__13
__14
__15
__16
__17 or
older