Submitting Surveys for Publication
As Flashlight Templates

This document is both for people submitting surveys and documentation for potential publication as part of the Flashlight Collection and for peer reviewers who are judging those submission.  The first part of the document is mainly for those preparing submissions, and the second part mainly for reviewers, but both groups should read the whole document.

Subscribers Can Submit Survey Packages for Publication in the TLT/Flashlight Collection

 “Templates” are surveys that new authors can use either “as is” or as a first draft for writing their own surveys.  A survey package includes a template, documentation on why and how to use it, and an example of how data from the survey has been used by the author or others in the past. (More on the content of survey packages can be found below.)

We invite you to submit a survey package (a survey template plus documentation) for peer review and possible publication if you think it would be useful faculty, staff and student authors at some of the 130+ TLT/ Flashlight subscribing institutions around the world.

Who Can Submit a Survey Package for Potential Publication?

Anyone associated with a TLT/Flashlight subscriber institutions may submit a survey package:

• a student who has used the instrument in a dissertation,

• a faculty member who has used the instrument to study his or her own course,

• an administrative unit that has done a needs assessment

• an accreditation self-study team that has studied achievement

• a vice-president who has collected data for a cost-analysis

• ....

Surveys need not deal with educational uses of technology..

What to Submit, and How

Submissions should include:

1. a statement of purpose for the study, description of respondents (e.g., students), 

2. method(s) of conducting the study,

3. summary of findings,

4. brief description of how the findings were worth the effort. 

5. assurance that you have the legal right to allow The TLT Group and its subscribers to use, modify, and distribute the materials you have submitted.

Optional: include in your submission a brief summary of the validity and reliability tests of the survey plus any relevant references. 

These descriptive materials would be used, along with the survey itself, to inform potential users.

Topics: Surveys should be useful for improving education at any level (college, school, corporate training; course, institution, national, international). 

NOT required: The survey need not have been created with Flashlight tools or methods. The survey does not need to deal with educational uses of technology.

Survey packages and questions about the review process should be e-mailed to Steve Ehrmann, Director of the Flashlight Program < ehrmann@tltgroup.org >.

Review Process

Each survey will be reviewed by at least two reviewers.  Some surveys may be tested at the reviewers’ institutions. See below for rubric to be used in evaluating surveys for inclusion in Flashlight.  Each package will be reviewed independently on four criteria (purpose, plan, validation/reliability, report) as shown in the scoring sheet below.

After independent review, reviewers will confer and agree on a final rating:

1) Not appropriate for publication to Flashlight users. Author will receive feedback.

2) Promising; returned to the author for improvement (or modified by reviewers, with revisions returned to the author for approval)

3) Appropriate for publication as a survey package.

Publication

Survey packages will be published in at least two media:

• survey will be available as a Flashlight-approved template on Flashlight Online

• survey package will be available on the TLT/Flashlight Web site for subscribers.

Invitation to Serve as a Peer Reviewer

We also invite you to serve as a peer reviewer, to make this process of user-to-user sharing work. If you’re interested in serving as a member of the peer review committee in this publication process or if you have questions, please send e-mail to Steve Ehrmann at Ehrmann@tltgroup.org.

RUBRIC FOR EVALUATING SURVEYS FOR INCLUSION IN FLASHLIGHT