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THE CASE
We were hired as a subcontractor by a large research firm doing a study for
apublic housing authority. The purpose of the study was to understand why a
particular group of public housing residents were not meeting the housing
authority's work requirement. Not meeting the work requirement means that
those residents are in violation of their lease and can be evicted. Rather
than enforce the policy and its consequences, the housing authority was
seeking to better understand why so many residents have trouble meeting the
work requirement. Ultimately, they wanted to learn what they can do better
to support residents in overcoming their barriers to work. So, they
commissioned the study. The large research firm was primarily responsible
for study design, analysis, and reporting. We were subcontracted as the
field team, responsible for data collection.
Here is how this study was conducted:
• The housing authority provided the research firm with records on
all their
residents—those who weren’t meeting the work requirement and those
who
were—because their records were so messy and split across so many
different files that the housing authority couldn’t figure out
which
residents were not meeting the work requirement and were therefore
eligible
for inclusion in the study.
• We enlisted property managers and the case managers at the
various social
service agencies that served the public housing residents to hand
out
fliers and spread the word about the study to everyone.
• We mailed postcards to everyone in the sampling frame (just those
who were
not meeting the work requirement) telling them about the study and
telling
them when they could expect our researchers to be at their site
knocking on
doors.
• The president of the housing authority sent a letter to the
sampling frame
telling them about the study and encouraging participation.
• We sent teams of two into the field, knocking on the doors of
everyone in
the sampling frame.
• One member of each team was a public housing resident herself,
and she was
always assigned to areas at least 5 miles from her home.
• Residents were given the option of being interviewed in their own
homes or
in an office or other pre-designated area nearby. They were also
offered
the options of doing the interview on the spot, scheduling a time in
the
future, or doing it by phone with a research assistant back at our
office.
• The field research teams conducted a thorough informed consent
process that
included a 2-page consent form written at a 6th grade reading level
in
larger size font for anyone with vision impairments.
• The hour-long interview covered many domains in detail: family,
physical
health, mental health, education and work history, alcohol and
substance
use, sources of income, illicit activity, criminal histories,
barriers to
work, and so on.
• Each resident that participated received a $50 grocery store gift
card at
the completion of their interview or at the point she or he
terminated the
interview. |
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