New Survey on Election Administration in Support of Presidential Commission

[Image courtesy of emfsafetynetwork]

A group of academics has fielded an online survey for election officials nationwide intended to gather information relevant to efforts of the Presidential Commission on Election Administration.

The survey, a joint effort by Harvard’s Stephen Ansolabehere, the University of Texas’ Daron Shaw and Charles Stewart of MIT, includes a wide range of questions, including inquiries about

• + office budgets and recent purchases;
• + recent challenges and innovations at the local level;
• + Election Day preparation (including machine allocation and contingency planning);
• + voting information resources like websites or voter guides; and
• + an informal census of election officials’ education and experience.

Election offices across the nation have received a link to the survey, to be conducted by Sentis Research. Individual responses will be kept confidential and results will be reported only in aggregate. The deadline for responses is Friday, September 13.

As readers of this blog know, I am a big fan of any effort to glean more data in the study of election administration. I offer kudos to the scholars for fielding this survey and encourage election offices across the nation to spend some time helping to provide the Commission – and eventually, the whole election community – with invaluable data that can be used to inform and shape efforts to improve election administration nationwide.

[NOTE: This post has been updated to reflect that the Commission itself is not fielding the survey.]