ASHA Develops Its Agenda Based On Worthless Online Survey With Laughable 1.9% Response Rate

ASHA is not listening to you. Just shut up and pay your dues!

The Government Relations and Public Policy Board (GRPPB) developed the 2011 agenda in consultation with committees, staff, and members (2,700 of whom responded to the survey seeking input). Link (bold and italics added) The ASHA Leader 1/18/11

ASHA has over 140,000 members. If ASHA developed its 2011 agenda based in part on the response to an online survey with only 2,700 responses, that means that the response rate was only 1.9%. This is worthless data - total crap (ASHA might as well be doing tarot readings to divine what members are thinking - they would probably be more accurate). ASHA - and anyone who has ever taken a statistics 101 course - knows this but that doesn't stop ASHA from charging ahead.
What are acceptable response rates?

High survey response rates help to ensure that survey results are representative of the target population...A survey must have a good response rate in order to produce accurate, useful results...Acceptable response rates vary by how the survey is administered:

• Mail: 50% adequate, 60% good, 70% very good
• Online: 30% average
• Face-to-face: 80-85% good. International Assessment Resources

Eric Graig, Ph.D., writes:

Would you make an important decision based upon only 10% of the available information out there? I hope not, but that’s just what you’re doing if you accept such a small response rate. The key to a strong survey response rate is a well written invitation to participate and, most important, follow-up with non-respondents. With ‘friendly’ respondents, that is those who know your organization and have made some kind of commitment to it, it can take three or more follow-ups to get response. We typically see 15% to 20% with the first invite and then upwards of 60% or 70% by the final round...without follow-up to non-respondents you just can’t get the response rate you need to make solid business decisions. Eric Graig, Ph.D. Principal Usable Knowledge, LLC Link

Note that Graig is criticizing a 10% response rate.
ASHA's miserable 1.9% response rate means that their online surveys are beneath being considered by any intelligent person. It is more evidence that ASHA has no serious interest in listening to its members. Keep in mind that ASHA declared that it had total assets of $93,966,900 in 2008. The cost of contracting with an independent firm to do a reliable and valid survey would be chump change for them.
Let me put ASHA's bs surveys in perspective:
Since this blog started, I've received (well) over 5,000 emails from SLPs who strongly disagree with ASHA (some of the letters contain so much heated outrage and anger that they are almost radioactive). This blog has received close to 50,000 visitors since it started. That gives this blog a response rate of 10% - and I'm not even running a survey! 

ASHA's online surveys are statistically worthless

You may ask:
"Why not just send all those emails to ASHA and let them know what members think?"
Answer: I have forwarded letters to ASHA's boss - Arlene Pietranton - and what I usually got in return were dismissive and self-rationalizing responses - which appears to be ASHA's standard coping strategy for dealing with criticism of ASHA. ASHA will never admit that it is wrong about anything. Writing ASHA is a pointless exercise in futility because ASHA's philosophy is that it is always right and the members are always wrong. Always. ASHA is going to do whatever it wants to do - and the members exist for no other reason than to foot the bill. Get in line, sheeple! And ASHA will continue to use worthless data to justify their escalating power and money grab of our profession.
This is the organization that has the audacity to claim that it stands for high quality evidence-based research data.
Sure. Whatever. When it comes to members, ASHA demands that we use high quality evidence-based research data. When it comes to itself, however, ASHA settles for worthless garbage. ASHA's rules don't apply to itself - only to YOU.
Anyone who loves this profession should be alarmed that an organization like ASHA controls our future.

__________________________________

Paul "ASHA Rocks!" Rao
Another Rah-Rah

News item: Paul R. Rao is ASHA's new president (no telling how many votes he got in that online election. What was it? A thousand? Five hundred? Fifty? Maybe a single Twitter tweet to the board of directors?) I hope he enjoys being a rubber stamp for ASHA's board of directors as that is pretty much the only function of ASHA's presidents. The president of ASHA is little more than window dressing for ASHA - ASHA's answer to hare-brained Vanna White's job on Wheel of Fortune. Paul's new job description requires that he:

 ...make sure that Board resolutions are carried out Link

Thanks, Paul. Anyone hoping for change in the next year is in for disappointment. I expect Paul "ASHA Rocks!" Rao to be yet another ASHA rah-rah cheerleader - out of touch with both the membership and the reality of what ASHA is really about.

______________________________

Second news item: I want to thank the SLPs who nominated me to be ASHA's president next year. I am humbled by your vote of confidence. I have declined, however, due to the fact that ASHA's president has so little power. He does little more than show up at meetings, make a few speeches, and write a few articles. The type of serious reforms that ASHA needs won't be accomplished by doing any of that.

_______________________________

Third news item: ASHA is apparently doubling down on its commitment to the gay rights agenda. ASHA states that it is called to do this because it is "a leader in human rights." Hmm, that's not what its tax exempt application with the IRS states. ASHA will be shocked to learn that it is supposed to be a professional business association serving the professional interests of slps and audiologists, not the Rockville branch of the lavender political action committee. 

Actually, ASHA is very selective about which human rights they are for. Has anyone ever heard ASHA say a peep about the rights of the unborn? Of course not. Does ASHA care about the rights of Christian and Jewish ASHA members not to have association resources (which they pay for) used for purposes that they consider to be immoral? Of course not.

Attention ASHA: two can play that doubling down game. Cross the legal line that the IRS has laid out and you lose.