Question

Mayer High School's austerity committee wants to estimate the proportion of students that are pleased with the cleanliness of the campus. They consider two methods of obtaining a sample of 400 students from the 2,500 students at the school.

Part A: To make the process easier, the committee considers surveying the first 400 students who enter the gym during the school's first pep rally. Identify the type of sampling method proposed and discuss why this sampling method might be biased.

Part B: The second method the committee is contemplating involves using a random number generator app to choose a simple random sample of 400 students from a list of 2,500 student names. How could they implement this method?

Answer 1

Part A:

Type of Sampling: Convenience Sampling

It is a non-probability sampling technique. Though it is easy to carry out, it might be biased and can lead to under - representation or over - representation of particular groups within the sample. Since the sampling frame is not known and the sample is not chosen randomly, the inherent bias in convenience sampling means that the sample is unlikely to be representative of the population being studied.

Part B.

The committee can implement this method as follows:

Step 1: Assign Serial Number to each and every student of the total of 2,500 student names.

Step 2:Using Random Number Generator App, obtain 400 Random numbers.

Step 3; The 400 numbers got in Step 2 form the desired Sample of 400 students out of 2,500 students.