SCHOOL SPORT
ORGANISING COMMITTEE
A Guide to Fact Finding
Introduction
As a School Sport Organising Committee (SSOC) you will be a vital
part of the team who will be involved in making important decisions
and lead the planning and delivery of the Sainsbury’s School Games.
Over the course of the year the Youth Sport Trust will set you tasks to
complete that will help your Committee be effective, in order to help
you we will provide you with advice and guidance on the specific task.
Each task is also designed to develop skills that will help you in the
world of work or in your application for college or university.
To find out more visit www.yourschoolgames.com and download
‘School Sport Organising Committee — Young Person Guidance.’
The first skill we are looking to develop is FACT FINDING. In order for
your committee to make the right decisions for young people in your
school you need to understand what they want from the Sainsbury’s
School Games and sport in your school. To do this you will need to
use fact finding techniques to help you make these decisions.
This Guide will take you through a simple process that will help you
understand what young people in your school want from the Sainsbury’s
School Games and school sport:
1.
What is fact finding? What types of methods and data are there?
2.
Putting your survey together — choosing your questions.
3.
What type of survey to use: paper or online?
4.
Producing your survey.
5.
You have your data. What next?
6.
A five-step process to take you through your first project.
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1.
What is fact finding?
Fact finding is one way of describing the collection of information
for a particular purpose. Your purpose may be to find out the date
and timings of each Sainsbury's School Games event, which will
help your Committee’s planning of the Sainsbury’s School Games.
What is a method?
What is data?
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2.
r survey
Putting together you
Types of questions
Take a look at some questions you could use to put together
your survey:
Open-ended questions
These are questions where a person completing the survey has total
freedom to choose the content and length of their answer. For this type
of question you will usually see a question and an open text box below.
Closed-ended questions
A closed-ended question is one where you have to choose a particular
answer. There are three types of closed-ended questions that you can
use in your surveys:
Scaled questions
Scale questions are used to measure or compare someone’s response
to a statement or belief.
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3.
r online?
Survey type: paper o
To help you decide, take a look at the advantages and disadvantages
of paper surveys versus online surveys:
Paper surveys
Online surveys
Advantages
Advantages
Disadvantages
Disadvantages
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4.
ey
Producing your surv
Once you have decided, take a look at the how-to guides and
templates below to help you on your way.
How-to guides and templates
Paper survey guides
Online survey guides
Five things you need to know
about creating your own survey
1. Introduce your survey
2. Choose your font carefully
3. Test the survey
4. Add instructions
5. Think about the sample size of your survey
Or... do the survey in person
Instead of sending out your survey you can also talk people through
your survey yourself, either one-to-one or in a group. This means you
can explore the questions more fully and hear people express their
answers and opinions.
Interviews/focus group
Video
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5.
at next?
wh
You have your data —
So, you have completed your survey, whether on paper, online or in
person, and have gathered lots of answers and responses. Next you
need to analyse this data, and use it to understand what people are
saying and which changes need to be made.
Quantitative data analysis
Quantitative data analysis can be done using a calculator, paper and pen or
you can enter the data into a spreadsheet like Microsoft Excel. The following
are some calculations you can do to help you understand your data.
Qualitative analysis
Collect comments from people's responses to questions (interviews or open
text survey questions) which are relevant to your decision making.
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6.
teps
Fact finding — five s
Whatever your project or undertaking, these five steps should help
see you through the process of fact finding:
1.Decide what you want to find out — for example, what do you need to
know to make important decisions for the Sainsbury’s School Games?
2.Choose the methods which are most suitable considering the time
and resources you have available. Try and use a mix of qualitative and
quantitative methods.
3.Decide on a suitable sample size and decide how best to get people
to answer your questions.
4.Make a plan and set deadlines for when the fact finding mission should
be complete.
5.Go ahead and fact find, analyse the data you collect and then make
those decisions.
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