Abstract
In this chapter we present an overview of the design and execution of our research, singling out those features of the program and research context of our study, of our general approach to the collection and use of data, and of our strategies for measurement and analysis that we believe are unusual or innovative. It is our intent to provide a description not only of these features, but also of problems and solutions that arose in the course of our research.
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As noted in Corwin (1977), there was much ambiguity over this issue on the part of federal program officers, most of whom seemed to feel that the program was unduly constrained by the preferences of the researchers. However, we often felt, as researchers, that we were unduly constrained by preferences of the program monitors. The original scope-of-work statement for the overall project called for formative evaluation and technical assistance on matters of local evaluation, as well as for the types of summative research reported in this volume, but the inherent tension among the three proved, in this study of 10 geographically dispersed rural school districts, to be a particular problem very early in the project and led to emphasis exclusively upon summative research.
The overall study questions are addressed in Herriott (1980), which synthesizes the findings of the five separate studies. The questions are: (1) What social, political, and historical phenomena characterize the experimental schools? (2) What has been the impact of this program on pupils, schools, and their communities? (3) What changes persist beyond the period of federal funding? (4) What knowledge has been gained through this program for educational policy makers and practitioners?
We should emphasize that we realize that there is no hard and fast distinction between insiders and outsiders. The greater the amount of contact that an outsider has with a system, the more likely it is that she or he will reflect actual member views as opposed to partially analyzed views. Similarly, the role of the “marginal man” as an informant is well known among anthropologists and field researchers.
A pilot questionnaire was sent to personnel in six districts in the spring of 1973. Except for the fall of 1973 (which was an anonymous questionnaire), all subsequent surveys were made in the spring of the school year and were not anonymous. Background characteristics were obtained only once, via the first spring questionnaire to which a staff member responded.
The five facets of comprehensive change were deliberately designed to be specific to the ES program. However, such a vector of implementation that locates the change within a system is clearly modifiable to the study of implementation in other programs of planned change.
Although the facets are specific to the ES program and this vector is modifiable for other programs, the dimensions are relevant to any program that attempts to make more than minor adaptations within a social organization.
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© 1981 Plenum Press, New York
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Rosenblum, S., Louis, K.S. (1981). Methodology and Research Procedures. In: Stability and Change. Environment, Development, and Public Policy. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-3234-3_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-3234-3_3
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