ED Response to OMB Comments

2

TO: Sharon Mars

FROM: Marsha Silverberg

DATE: September 8, 2015

RE: Response to OMB Questions for New ICR: Student Messaging in GEAR UP Demonstration

Thank you for the questions related to our recent Information Clearance Request (ICR).

201503-1850-002

07/01/2015

ED/IES

Student Messaging in GEAR UP Demonstration

Received in OIRA

ICR New

We have provided our responses under each of OMB’s questions, presented below:

1. In the student baseline survey, under question 15, it is unclear whether students are supposed to select one option, or all that apply.  It may be helpful to provide instructions or to put yes and no boxes for each of the four options, so that students can select an answer for each choice.

To improve the clarity of question 15, we will turn this question into a grid with three answer choices (Yes, No, I don’t know) for each college type option.  The question will now read:

15. By the end of this school year, do you think you will have met the minimum requirements needed for admission to a…

	Yes	No	I don’t know
School that provides occupational training, usually less than 2 years?			
2-year community college?			
Typical 4-year college?			
Highly selective 4-year college such as Harvard University?			

2.       Is there any concern that by randomizing within programs, there could be spillover effects between students in the treatment groups and the control group?  Or, do IES and OPE believe that because the texts are tailored to the selected college, spillover would be minimal?

ED is largely not concerned about the ramifications of spillover effects, for several reasons.  First, most GEAR UP seniors will scatter, not only to different colleges but to different programs within the same colleges.  While many projects hope to conduct workshops on campus at local colleges where clusters of GEAR UP students go, participation in those group activities are uncertain; any other interactions among students within our sample will be happenstance.  Second, as noted, the content of the texts will be somewhat differentiated, depending on the college the student intends to and does attend.  Finally, a key feature of our intervention, as recommended by our consultant Ben Castleman, is the ability to obtain real-time, individualized help from a GEAR UP-related counselor.  Only students who are in the treatment group will have access to that through digital communication.