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NLTS2 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

This page contains answers to many frequently asked questions about NLTS2. Please contact us if you have additional questions or comments.

1. What is NLTS2?
2. Who funds NLTS2?
3. Who is conducting NLTS2?
4. What activities are involved in NLTS2?
5. What is involved in the school data collection activities?
6. What is the study timeline?
7. How much time will the data collection activities take?
8. Will NLTS2 information be confidential?
9. How were school districts and students selected for the study?

What is NLTS2?

The National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 (NLTS2), commissioned to begin in 2001 by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP), will be a follow-up of the original NLTS. The original NLTS was designed and conducted by SRI for OSEP from 1985 through 1993. NLTS2 will include 12,000 youth nationwide who are ages 13 through 16 at the start of the study. Information collected over the next 10 years from parents, youth, and schools will provide a national picture of the experiences and achievements of young people as they transition into early adulthood. The study will:

• Describe the characteristics of secondary school students in special education and their households.

• Describe the secondary school experiences of students in special education, including their schools, school programs, related services, and extracurricular activities.

• Describe the experiences of students once they leave secondary school, including adult programs and services, social activities, etc.

• Measure the secondary school and postschool outcomes of students in the education, employment, social, and residential domains.

• Identify factors in students' secondary school and postschool experiences that contribute to more positive outcomes.

Who funds NLTS2?

NLTS2 is funded by the Office of Special Education Programs in the U.S. Department of Education as part of the national assessment of IDEA '97.

Who is conducting NLTS2?

NLTS2 is being conducted by SRI International, a scientific research institute located in Menlo Park, California, and Westat, a research firm located in Rockville, Maryland.

What activities are involved in NLTS2?

The data collection activities outlined below include a variety of sources: parents/guardians, youth, teachers, principals, and school records.

• Telephone interviews. Parents will be contacted for telephone interviews about the experiences of their youth and their family life. Interviews began in spring 2001 and will repeat every other year thereafter until 2009. Youth who are able to complete a telephone interview will also be contacted beginning in 2003. NLTS2 will send out a family/youth survey for those families who were unable to be interviewed. The telephone interviews with parents and youth and the family/youth surveys are provided in both English and Spanish.

• School staff surveys. Teachers and school staff who know the youth well will be asked to complete a mail survey about the youth's school program. Principals or school coordinator will be asked to provide information about the youth's school, such as information about teacher training, school safety, and school policies. These surveys will be conducted in the spring of 2002 and 2004 for all students who are still in school in those years.

• Direct assessments. An individual assessment will be conducted by a trained professional with eligible youth. The assessment will be arranged at a time convenient for the student and, in most cases, will be given at his or her school. Parents will be notified when an assessment has been scheduled. The direct assessment will include the following areas: reading, math, and a student interview. The student interview will cover how students feel about themselves, about school and learning, and about their social relationships. When the direct assessment is not appropriate, an alternate assessment will be conducted by a teacher familiar to the student.

  The assessment will take place only once, in either the spring of 2002 or the spring of 2004, when the student is from 16 to 18 years old.

• Transcripts. From the transcripts provided by schools, we hope to know about the classes students take and how well they do in school. Beginning in the spring of 2002, for each student i 10th grade or higher, a transcript will be collected every year until the student leaves school.

What is involved in the school data collection activities?

How is school compensated for participating in NLTS2? To express our appreciation to teachers and staff for participating in NLTS2, 20 study schools will be randomly selected to receive $500 gift certificates for school supplies. School site study coordinators receive a stipend* for being a point of contact between the school and the study. Each teacher completing a survey questionnaire receives $5 honorarium.

*The study will send a stipend of $50 to $280, depending on the number of students in the study at the school, school and district policies permitting.

What does a study coordinator do?

1. Confirms whether study students are currently attending the coordinator’s school. For students who are currently attending the school, provides the names of the teachers who would be best able to complete a questionnaire about them. For students who are no longer at the school, indicates what school they transferred to (if that information is available).
   
   
2. Encourages teachers to complete the questionnaires and distributes questionnaires to teachers, if necessary. If teachers do not reply to the surveys, the coordinator also may be asked to distribute follow-up questionnaires to them.
   
   
3. Completes a questionnaire about the school, which will also be mailed this spring.
   
   
4. Provides transcripts for study students in the school who have completed the ninth grade.
   
   
5. Helps research staff who will be conducting the student assessments by providing the name of the appropriate teacher to contact about each student.

Who completes the survey questionnaires?

School Program Survey. This survey goes to the person best able to describe the overall school program of the student.

Teacher Survey. This survey goes to the person who teaches the named student’s first academic general education class on a typical Monday. (An academic class is one that takes place in a general education setting in one of the following subjects: Language Arts, Mathematics, Sciences, Social Sciences, Humanities, or Foreign Language. This does not include physical education, music, art, adolescent skills, health, home economics, or industrial or other vocationally oriented areas and does not include any special education class.)

What if the student has changed schools and/or moved? We want to follow students until 2009. Students, their parents, and their schools can inform NLTS2 e-mail, by toll-free number, or by using the Web site update.

How will confidentiality be protected? All information collected for the study will be completely confidential, and the results of the study will not disclose information about any individual child, school, or school district. The Director of the Family Policy Compliance Office of the U.S. Department of Education which authorizes you to provide student information to SRI under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). The NLTS2 study is authorized to collect data under law 20 U.S.C. 123g; 34 CFR Part 99. Schools are permitted to disclose to the study information contained in students' education records without fear of violating FERPA because SRI is acting as an authorized representative of the U.S. Department of Education.

What is the study timeline?

The table below depicts the timing of each planned study activity. Note that the school background survey will need to be completed only once in the event that several sampled students attend the same school. In addition, the school characteristics survey will be completed for each new school that sampled students attend, not the same school repeatedly.

How much time will the data collection activities take?

The following table depicts the estimated amount of time that will be required for each type of data collection.

How were school districts and students selected for the study?

Through a careful process, a selected number of school districts were identified, based on their geographic region, size, and socioeconomic status. These school districts were contacted and invited to participate in the study. In all cases, a district was given the option not to participate in NLTS2. For each district that agreed to participate, NLTS2 asked for the district's list of special education students along with their grade, date of birth, and disability classification. From the more than 500 districts that agreed to participate, approximately 12,000 students were randomly selected to participate in NLTS2. This selection was based on the student's age and disability classification.

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Updated 12/02
SRI International 2002

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