First of all, I would like to begin by acknowledging how cringey my title is (believe me I know). Unfortunately though, that's all I could think of, so oh well.
So for today’s blog post, I am going to be focusing on three main things: something about my project that gives me hope, something that I feel meh about, and something that makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry myself to sleep.
Although crying in a ball sounds like a lot of fun, I am going to try and start this post of on a cheerful note about what is going well with my project and gives me hope for the months to come. In this category, the first thing I want to talk about is my interest in the project. We are almost two months into this class, and I am still intrigued by my topic and the nuance and complexity that comes along with it. Even after all of the time and work I have spent reading sources, taking notes, and working on assignments, I am still just as curious about the answers I am looking for as when I began. And while this may seem not that important, to me it is not only important, but also encouraging because I tend to lose interest in projects fairly quickly if I am not intrigued by the subject. Additionally, I am also happy about the general progress that is being made. I believe that for the time that we have spent on everything so far, I think that I am at a pretty good spot. While there are still concerns that I certainly need to address (which I will), I think that I am at least managing what is expected of me pretty well.
So now from the good to the meh.
Right now I feel pretty meh about my list of sources. On one hand, I am pretty proud of all of the sources that I have already collected and annotated, but on the other hand, I still feel like there are a couple more sources that I need to find. Luckily, I do not need any more core sources for my paper, but instead I only need a couple supporting sources to clarify or substantiate a couple sections that need more evidence.
And now to the part where I talk about what makes me want to hide under the table and pretend like my project doesn't exist.
(Me when I was writing this part of my post)
For this section, there are three main things that I want to focus on: my methodology, how I will overcome bias, and how I will overcome the legal troubles of writing about basis. Regarding my methodology, I know that we do not need to know what exactly we intend to for our primary research, however it has been brought up to me that this is something that I should start thinking about now. Being that my project is about charter schools, I intend to spend time within some charter school/schools to try and draw conclusions about what it is that makes them successful. With that in mind though, I do not know whether I will be focusing solely on Basis Scottsdale, or if I will be analyzing other schools as well.
Additionally, another aspect of my project that worries me is how I will overcome bias in my analysis. Because I will most likely be spending a large amount of time looking at BASIS Scottsdale, I will need to find a way of justifying why I can still do qualitative analysis about the school, even though I have attended this school for many years. Because I already have preconceived notions about the school, I feel as if it may affect my results. As of right now, the only way of overcoming this bias that I have thought of is by justifying BASIS’ position as a good school, which I can use to explain why I want to look at it.
Lastly, I am concerned with the legal implications of looking at BASIS Scottsdale. Being that BASIS is a highly ranked and well regarded school, they want to maintain this high reputation. With that being said though, I want to try and perform as realistic of an analysis of the school as I can, even if that means that I find faults with the BASIS system (which I’m sure I will as no system is perfect). Being that I attend BASIS though, I feel as if there will be a conflict of interest if I am publishing results about a school which not only has power over me, but wants to project a certain image about their school which I may not fully support.
So with all of that being said, if you guys could help me with some ideas on how to overcome these setbacks that I have, then I will pretty much love you forever.
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Brian,
ReplyDeleteI feel like you are in a pretty good spot overall, but here are some suggestions to help with the stuff that is keeping you down. In regards to your methods, I do not really know the ins and outs of your project but it seems like observing similar classes (for example Chemistry) at a few charter schools might be the best way to actually be able to compare and judge the relative success of the schools. In regards to the bias, Bias is something that you will have to overcome since you are implicitly biased as you said. I think the best way for you to overcome the bias is to try and take a step back and just observe what is actually occurring in the classroom and see how the actual classroom behaviors correlate with results. Also I feel like a comparison between classroom behavior and results across multiple schools might make it more objective, but throughout the project the best way for you to stay unbiased is to be conscious of your own implicit bias and try to remove yourself from it. Finally, in regards to legal issues, I don't think BASIS can really control what your research says, but I also think that you will probably find mostly good things about BASIS, especially if you are comparing it to other schools. However, if your findings are bad, don't frame it as trashing BASIS. Frame it as suggestions to improve an already good school, BASIS. I'm no legal expert though, so I would look into that more if I were you. I think you are doing a great job so far and that you are in a good spot. Once you clear up your concerns (and you will), you will be on a great trajectory.
Brian, you shouldn't have legal troubles so long as in your paper you keep the school's name anonymous, which the College Board will require that you do, regardless. As far as eliminating your bias, you may need to, perhaps, go to other BASIS schools, not BASIS Scottsdale. Another thing is if you're looking only at the lower school and you don't have any direct experience with the lower school teachers, then I think that your bias may be mitigated, as you would have no direct experience with those teachers and the environments they're creating.
ReplyDeleteHi Brian,
ReplyDeleteLets address concerns, overcoming bias is a tough scenario especially with a study with observations. I don't know if you have looked into this yet, but maybe you should search for sources that pertain to eliminating bias in observation studies. But if there is nothing on that, pull the neutral lever when observing the classrooms, don't look for good or bad things, rather just observe and make conclusions after you observe. Now that I realized I skipped the first point lets backtrack. Primary research in this case could be observation of classroom factors. Maybe look into studies that describe how to employ observations. Brian, in terms of legal concerns, Just say you are going to do an analysis of the school. And hint that its probably gonna be a good review, but don't say it explicitly or sign off on something that says that. That being said I don't know legal, but just make sure you sign something that lets you conclude good or bad.