Practitioners are not adequately prepared to handle concerns related to the acceptability of the online survey medium from the worker's viewpoint because the literature has only begun to address this issue. This study assessed reactions to Web‐based questionnaires while moving an organization's climate survey online. Initial questions, posed via a paper‐and‐pencil instrument, gathered opinions concerning online surveys (n= 437). A Web‐based climate survey was then created and piloted (n = 98). Afterwards, die finalized instrument was administered (n= 403), and a follow‐up questionnaire was disseminated (n= 175) to further gauge workers' reactions. Despite some initial anonymity concerns, most personnel were amenable to online surveying, and the Web‐based medium did not appear to discourage participation from any subgroup (based on gender, race, military versus civilian classification, and workgroup size comparisons). This article, which is intended for practitioners considering the transition to Web‐based surveys as well as those interested in evaluating and improving current Web‐based survey processes, outlines issues regarding online survey implementation, offers a tool for evaluating survey software, and concludes with lessons learned and avenues for future research/practice.

Military organizations use survey methodology to assess attitudes related to command climate. Many commands are staffed with both military and civilian personnel. However, no previous research has examined the equivalence of a command climate

Jim gave a short presentation on the role of analog and digital computers at North Carolina State and their profound effect on the engineering curricula over the past few years.The first technical paper was a joint presentation on analog-computer determination of the time-domain equivalence of Laplace transfer functions. This paper was presented by Emilo Herrero and Jesus Leon. Emilo and Jesus are both graduate students in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Florida at Gainesville. This paper was, I believe, a fine example of the kind of student participation which is indispensable to the very existence of such groups as ACEUG and SCi. (It is my personal feeling that at least one such student paper should be actively solicited for every ACEUG and SCi technical session. In fact, I am convinced that we should make a very strong effort to involve undergraduate and graduate students in these sessions.)Since the theme of the meeting was simulation in education, we wanted at least one paper typical of faculty research in the simulation area. We therefore asked Dr. James Lowry, Professor of Electrical Engineering at Auburn University, to tell us about his work in the field of digital simulation. He actually presented two papers in this area, the first of which was A digital simulation technique based on system cannonical state variables. These papers, as might be expected, raised the old spectre of analog vs. digital simulation and stimulated some interesting discussion on the accuracy requirements necessary in the simulation of specific physical systems.Professor Alan Rogers of the Computer Science Department, University of Delaware, spoke next on Simulation in education from his base of experience in both industry and the university. Alan commented on the excellent quality of SIMULATION and made a plea for more effective and widespread use of its contents by the educational com-munity. He began his talk by defining the two terms which were particularly relevant to the meeting and to his subject, simulation and education: &dquo;Higher education,&dquo; he said, &dquo;is a process of achieving an understanding of the behavior, qualities, and useful characteristics of structures by observation and experience and by the development, testing, and manipulation of ideas expressed symbolically, i.e., by words, numbers, equations, and pictures.&dquo; He then pomted out that the definition of simulation is exactly analogous, and again I quote:&dquo;Simulation is a process for achieving an understanding of the behavior, qualities, and useful characteristics of structures through the determination, construction, and operation of models.&dquo; Thus, if we consider the word structures to mean both real and imaginary structures, education and simulation are truly analogous procedures and simulation has a great part to play in education. While there is not room here for a complete report of Alan's talk, I believe one other point he made warrants emphasis. In Greek and Roman times, small groups of ...

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