MLK

The majority of my rest of week two was spent at Bishop State CC, which served as the surveying site for the MLK neighborhood.  I spent my Tues-Thurs here signing in participants, consenting new ones, and administering the survey.  Administering the survey to a larger group is definitely different from in-home surveys.  You have the participants who goof off because they're with their friends or giggle at the sex questions.  But, I really had easy groups that really cooperated with me throughout the 408 question survey.  

If participants are noticeably falling behind on keeping up with my reading and the group's speed we pull them out and do a one-on-one survey.  Even when the survey is only supposed to take 1.5 hours (these can run up to 2+ hours) I really like administering these.  Spending one-on-one time with a child is pretty rewarding.  A particular 1-on-1 survey that I read was for a 10 year old girl on Friday.  We were at a different surveying site at a church in Whistler.  We could tell that this girl was going to be a sweetheart the second she was signed up by her mom.  One of the questions we are required to ask for new participants is their relationship with the person signing them up (parent, guardian, caregiver).  This is to ensure that the consenter is truly the child's primary guardian/caregiver.  This little girl came in with her mother and we asked the little girl what her relationship with the woman was.  She looked really confused, so we asked is this your mother or aunt, etc.  The little girl answered back with, "... uhm she's my bestest friend..."  So cute.  After prodding a little longer we finally got the answer we needed out of her-- that the woman was indeed her mother.  After signing her up and getting consent we placed the little girl in an older group because that was the next group being tested.  So we knew from the start that we would probably have to pull her out, but sometimes the younger participants surprise you and can really keep up.

So when she was pulled out, I started the 1-on-1 survey with her.  Throughout the survey she would interrupt me with... "Can I ask you a question?"  She was so sweet.  With her first interruption she told me that her sister felt really bad about something and she wanted to talk about it with me. I was a little nervous about this at first because I had no idea what she would be telling me, but it was super sweet.  She told me that this morning her sister spilt her juice.  And that her sister didn't want to tell her mother because she was afraid that she would get in trouble.  But she talked her sister into telling her mother and her mother wasn't upset.  Her mother wasn't mad, she understood that mistakes happen.  But the girl's sister still felt really guilty about wasting the juice.  We talked about it for awhile.  It was so innocent and sweet.  After we got through the survive, about 2 hours later, I asked her what she would be doing with her $15.  She said she was going to split it with her younger sister who wasn't old enough to take the survey.  And that she would spend her half on her godson.  Nothing for herself.  When i asked her why she wasn't going to spend anything on herself she explained that giving it to her sister and godson would make her happy.  What a sweetheart.