Expanding the Survey of Doctorate Recipients

• Activity Number: 20 - Challenges and Opportunities in Major Survey Redesigns: Experiences from the SIPP, NHIS, and SDR
• Type: Topic Contributed
• Date/Time: Sunday, July 30, 2017 : 2:00 PM to 3:50 PM
• Sponsor: Government Statistics Section
• Author(s): Wan-Ying Chang* and Daniel Foley and Karen Grigorian and Michael Yang and Lance Selfa
• Companies: NSF/NCSES and NSF/NCSES and NORC and NORC and NORC
• Keywords: sample design ; total survey error ; adaptive design ; survey efficiency ; longitudinal survey

Abstract

The Survey of Doctorate Recipients (SDR) is a biennial longitudinal survey conducted since 1973 on individuals with a U.S. research doctoral degree in a science, engineering, or health field. Support from Federal policymakers interested in understanding more about this highly-trained workforce with regard to employment and their specific fields of doctorates provided the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) the opportunity to significantly increase the SDR sample size for the 2015 survey cycle. To meet the new estimation requirements while maintaining the existing estimation capabilities, substantial changes were made to the sample design, data collection approach, survey data post-processing, and data products. The challenges of timely addressing the new demands included developing new estimation and sample design requirements, implementing and evaluating the changes, and outreaching to the user communities. The expansion of sample size and target population coverage of SDR also provided NCSES ample opportunities to explore other design features associated with presenting new data and optimizing both the cross-sectional and longitudinal data needs.