Statistics in Action: Explore a Successful Service-Learning Project Presented by Mary DeHart, Ed.D Professor of Mathematics Sussex County Community College 34 th Annual AMATYC Conference November 20, 2008

What is a service-learning project? A service-learning project is one in which students provide a service to their community while utilizing skills and knowledge that are relevant to their college courses.

This presentation will include:  A brief description of how the Pulse of Sussex County Service Learning Project began, and of the initial structure of the project  Examples of published surveys  Step-by-step details of how the current project is conducted  A discussion of how the project helps students to learn and understand Statistics

The Pulse of Sussex County Service Learning Project  Began in 2003  Involves the cooperation of SCCC students, faculty, administration, and the New Jersey Herald Newspaper

Sussex County, NJ: Population 153,384 Sussex County Community College Enrollment: 3,732

The Pulse of Sussex County Project  Initial Goals Give a voice to county residents Build stronger ties between the college and the community Provide Statistics students with the opportunity to see statistics in action.

The Project Begins  Meeting with The NJ Herald  Forming the Pulse of Sussex County Committee  Planning Survey Design  Deciding on the level of student involvement

Role of Statistics Professor  Recruit and train students  Supervise collection of survey topics and questions  Distribute topics and questions to committee members  Help to supervise survey process

Role of Students  Brainstorm survey topics  Formulate unbiased questions  Conduct surveys

Role of Pulse of Sussex County Committee  Review topics suggested by students  Select topics for surveys  Review and fine-tune unbiased questions

Role of SCCC Department of Institutional Research  Prepare survey forms  Help to monitor survey process  Record and analyze data  Present report to the New Jersey Herald

Challenges  Obtaining a random sample of Sussex County residents  Finding phones for students to use  Analyzing data in a timely fashion

October 2003 The First Two Surveys Topics The NJ Bear Hunt The War in Iraq 41 Students Participated 370 Surveys Completed

The New Jersey Bear Hunt Published November 30, 2003 Questions Have you ever seen a bear in Sussex County? Yes 91% No 9%

The New Jersey Bear Hunt Published November 30, 2003 Have you ever seen a destructive act by a bear? Yes 30.7% No 69%

The New Jersey Bear Hunt Published November 30, 2003 Questions Has the presence of bears in the county changed your behavior? Yes 37.4% No 61.2%

The New Jersey Bear Hunt Published November 30, 2003 Do you believe that there are too many bears in Sussex County? Yes 48.6% No 42.4%

The New Jersey Bear Hunt Published November 30, 2003 Should there be a bear hunt in New Jersey? Yes 43.6% No 44.4%

First Iraq War Survey Published: 12/15/03 Sadam Hussein Captured: 12/13/03

Overdevelopment Published February 15, 2004

Immigration Published August 8, 2004

Upcoming Presidential Election Published August 29, 2004

Improvements  25 new phone lines installed, 25 phones purchased so that calls can be made from one location  List of randomly generated residential phone numbers purchased

Sports Published October 3, 2004

Sports Survey: Graphs and Results of Follow-Up Interviews

Vacations Published November 21, 2004

2004 Presidential Election Published November 14, 2004

Bear Hunt Follow-Up Published December 22, 2004

Iraq War Follow-Up Published December 22, 2004

Dieting Published January 5, 2005

Social Security Published May 15, 2005

Cigarette Smoking Published July 3, 2005

Third Anniversary of the Start of the Iraq War Published March 19, 2006

Tattoos Published April 27, 2007

Do You Have Any Tattoos? StudentsCommunity

Do you have any tattoos? Students n = 183 Community n = 379

Quality of Life Survey Published January 29, 2006

Cell Phone Usage Published February 27, 2007

New Jersey State Budget Crisis Published June 1, 2008

Quality of Life in Sussex County Published March 16, 2008

2008 Presidential Election Published October 26, 2008

Pulse of Sussex County Projections Compared to Actual Election Results Election Results in Sussex County John McCain 59.5% Barack Obama 39.0%

Current Project: Trend Data from the Quality of Life Survey Example: Would you say that, compared to one year ago, the overall economy in the Sussex County region today is better, about the same, or worse?

Current Structure of Project  Typically Statistics students work on the project each semester.  Students are awarded 100 points of credit for the project: 20 points for generating topics and formulating questions, and 80 points for making phone calls.

A Step-by-Step Look at the Survey Process  Statistics students brainstorm topics.  Professor submits list of topics to the NJ Herald and the SCCC Department of Institutional Research  NJ Herald Editor, Institutional Researcher, and Professor discuss and select 2 topics per survey session.

 Students formulate 5 or 6 unbiased questions per survey topic.  Editor, Institutional Researcher, and Professor review questions and edit if necessary.  Survey forms are prepared by the Department of Institutional Research

 Professor or Institutional Researcher present the survey to the students and provide a short training session.  Surveys are conducted on three consecutive evenings from 6:30 – 8:45 PM.  The Professor and the Institutional Researcher supervise the students. Each student is required to work one evening.

 Department of Institutional Research scans form and compiles a report to send to the Professor and the NJ Herald.  NJ Herald publishes articles.  The report and the articles are discussed with the students.

The Pulse of Sussex County Changes and Challenges  No more committee  Scanning software facilitates data entry  SCCC Journalism students helped with the reporting on the 2008 Presidential survey  Honors Statistics students will begin to help with the analysis of data during the spring 2009 semester

Benefits of the Project for Teaching and Learning  Students learn the challenges of collecting sample data  They have an experiential context in which to place statistical concepts such as sampling techniques design of surveys formulation of unbiased questions sample size confidence intervals margin of error etc.

The 39 surveys that have been completed for the Pulse of Sussex County Project would not have been possible without the help of more than 600 SCCC Statistics students and the following people:  Dr. Bradley Gottfried, former SCCC President  Bruce Tomlinson, General Manager, New Jersey Herald  Chris Frear, Editor, New Jersey Herald  Rob Schmicker, former SCCC Institutional Researcher  Matthew Miller, SCCC Associate Director of Institutional Research  Jo-Ann Harby, SCCC Department of Institutional Research All Pulse of Sussex County Reports submitted to the New Jersey Herald were produced by the SCCC Department of Institutional Research.

Thank you for your attention. Mary DeHart (973)