Content Details
ED468964 - Customer Satisfaction Survey Report 1997: How Do We Measure Up? Technical Report
- Category
- Executive Agency Publications
- Collection
- Education Reports from ERIC
- SuDoc Class Number
- ED 1.615:
- Date Issued
- January 1, 1999
- Author
- Thurgood, Lori; Fink, Steven; Bureika, Rita; Scott, Julie; Salvucci, Sameena
- Source Institution
- National Center for Education Statistics (ED), Washington, DC.; Synectics for Management Decisions, Inc., Arlington, VA
- Publication Type
- Numerical/Quantitative Data, Reports - Research, Tests/Questionnaires
- Subject
- Elementary Secondary Education, Government Publications, Government Role, Higher Education, Information Dissemination, Public Agencies, Research Reports
- Identifiers
- Customer Satisfaction, National Center for Education Statistics
- Abstract
- The 1997 National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Customer Satisfaction survey was conducted to find out whether the NCES as an agency was responding to the needs of customers and to identify areas for improvement. Federal, state, and local education officials and academic researchers were asked about their satisfaction with NCES products and services and about other organizations from which they receive education data. There were 2,948 eligible individuals in the sample, and responses were received from 2,465 (84%). Local policymakers are a key customer group, yet only half were current users of NCES products and services. A majority of users were frequent users, and a very high percentage of respondents reported being satisfied or very satisfied with NCES publications and reports, and these publications and reports received high marks on most aspects. Users were satisfied with all aspects of NCES publications except timeliness. NCES data files were not as widely used as reports and publications, but were ranked as highly. Users were most dissatisfied with the timeliness and use of data files. Most customers did not know how to contact the NCES and were not fully aware of the broad range of services. NCES users most often used their State Department of Education as another source of education data. Local policymakers were apt to prefer their benchmarks organizations and rate them more highly than the NCES, but federal and state policymakers did not rate benchmark organizations above the NCES. Overall, NCES did well in comparison with the "best of the rest," but areas for improvement were noted. Four appendixes contain supplemental information, including the survey. (Contains 30 figures and 28 tables.) (SLD) r.