The push polling / online survey event was excruciating. I forgot how much I loathe cold calling as a telemarketing person many, many years ago. The main thing is that I had the opportunity to see how the online survey Catyshack worked. It is a brilliant program that is efficient yet not very difficult to understand. It is like going to work at a call center and bring up the different screens needed, according to the type of information you are entering into the system. I made ten calls exactly, and spoke with two people directly. One person was from a social services office, and wondered how or why I got her, or reached her office under the circumstances. That was very interesting if I had not been in such a bundle of nerves, and could have recognized the opportunity to discuss with her her concern for the issue of hunger in this region, being a social services representative herself, would have made very interesting write-up. However, after explaining I was from the FSU sociology department conducting a survey, she declined the interview. The next person I spoke with was a bit more willing, even if my computer screen was not. She seemed to be an older person in the mid to late fifties range, who was on the way out of the door to run errands and asked how long it would take. I explained that it would take only ten minutes or so. When I tried to bring up the interview questions my screen would not cooperate and I had to finally explain the situation and end the call. The rest of the calls were answering machines, hang-ups, or not in service. Unfortunately I did not actually get to discuss any of the questionnaire, and analyze the information later.
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