Costs and benefits of reaching parents for survey participation through school communication systems: testing the potential of a straightforward convenience sample

Drawing a random sample for surveys from official registers is an expensive and time-consuming procedure in Belgium as in other countries. In order to obtain a sample for a study on work-family life balance amongst working mothers in Flanders (the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium), I opted for a promising, economical procedure by first selecting children in schools and day-care facilities. Given the compulsory nature of schooling in Belgium and the widespread use of day-care facilities, this offers a straightforward 'convenience' sampling for reaching working parents, and mothers in particular. In this paper, I describe the details and advantages of this cost-effective sampling strategy and the experiences with this test case. I also discuss the possible methodological downsides and how to avoid them in future research.