New survey resources network

The Survey Resources Network, a new service funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), will be officially launched on Thursday, April 23, 2009.

The Survey Resources Network, a new service funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), will be officially launched on Thursday, April 23, 2009. The service will be funded for three years in the first instance to co-ordinate and develop ESRC activities related to survey research methods.

The Network will aim to provide a coherent and integrated approach to the development of skills and knowledge, the dissemination of research findings and research resources, and the promotion of best survey practice.

It brings together the ESRC’s investments in survey research and aims to enhance the quality of training and resources available to researchers by:

• Enhancing, facilitating and linking on-line resources such as the Question Bank to training and methodological research.
• Providing a Survey Skills programme offering a wide range of capacity-building and training opportunities. Survey Skills will cover all stages of the survey research process and offer workshops, placements and training opportunities.
• Fostering and promoting the development of new methods within survey research.
• Co-ordinating with international organisations and networks to provide strategic advice to the ESRC regarding survey research methods.
• Providing a scoping report identifying the potential for improving the efficiency and quality of data collection in the UK.

For more information about the Network, please visit www.surveynet.ac.uk.

The Survey Resources Network is co-directed by Peter Lynn (University of Essex) and Bob Erens (National Centre for Social Research). The Network is a collaboration between the Institute for Social and Economic Research, the National Centre for Social Research, the Centre for Longitudinal Studies, the London School of Economics and the University of Southampton.

Several members of CLS staff are involved in the network:

Shirley Dex is contributing to Survey Skills (http://www.surveynet.ac.uk/ssp/introduction.asp)

John ‘Mac’ McDonald and Lisa Calderwood are involved with the Survey Management Systems project (http://www.surveynet.ac.uk/sms/introduction.asp) and, along with Sosthenes Ketende, in the Survey Design and Measurement Initiative (http://www.surveynet.ac.uk/sdmi/introduction.asp).