Week 10: Capstone idea

 Imagine being a child, walking into a new space, its afterschool and you're excited about this new program that maybe you know is STEM, but like, what's STEM? You hear it, you see it in action, you may even know its acronym (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) break down. But STEM is so many things that you aren't totally sure what it is and what this program you just walked into is going to be. You're just curious and maybe a little nervous because you are in a new space with a couple of friends but you don't know the adult in the room, nor every youth. You come in, you get to pick a group to sit with and you get a basic introduction to STEM Mentoring. The adult plays a game with you and you learn a couple of other people's names. 

Then, you get told your going to do a pre survey. You get told your ID, "STEM1" and the adult puts you on a device where you need to navigate stemmentoringri.com, click on communities, click on your community, and scroll down until you find the presurvey link. Click on it and it brings up the survey. The first 5 questions ask you questions about yourself, your identity and your family that you have probably been asked before, but not in this way, you have to type in your answers.

            "What is your race/ethnicity?" _______________

You're not sure how to answer this question that doenst have boxes like "White" , "African American", or "Asian". But the adult in the room comes over and asks you more questions, "where do your parents, grand parents or ancestors come from? For example, I am White and Italian. Some of your friends parents are Dominican and Puerto Rican, Latin X." The light bulb goes off and you finally understand what you are being asked and type in your answer, being told that spelling doesnt matter and try your best. You click on the next page and find about 25 more questions with statements like, "I get along well with kids my age" and answers you need to select, "agree", "neutral or IDK", "disagree." If you're lucky, by the time you, and your peers are done, you maybe get to play another game or watch a video before your first day at the STEM Mentoring program is over. 

This picture I painted is a typical first day in many of our STEM Mentoring RI sites. I feel this is confusing, potentially boring, uncomfortable and causing anxiety in an already new space. So to add a 30 question survey for 6-10 year olds to complete sounds absurd to me. Not only to mention that we know youth are not honest in a setting they do not feel comfortable in, but we also need to take into consideration the power dynamics at play. A youth is coming into an educators space, that adult is the deciding power figure in the room, this perfect stranger that, as a child, you have been told to trust, has not earned your trust yet and is asking you to complete a very long survey that likely feels like a test after a long day of school. Best case scenario is that this child already knows this adult and does feel comfortable with them, however they are still asking youth to complete this test like survey, something they have likely never done before, so what is this survey, who is looking at it, why should I trust it? 

Not only do these dynamics of power and feeling of dis/trust alter the results of the research, but the research itself is inequitable, unreasonable and dehumanizing. For my capstone, I would like to change the research being done by STEM Mentoring RI. 

At first I thought it would be cool to reevaluate and change our research practices with the help of our youth, my peer mentors that have years of experience with the surveys. I thought we could change our practices to be more equitable, welcoming and create trusting relationships. I also thought that most of these altering strategies would be more qualitative focused. But I believe my biggest problem are the educators conducting the research and collecting the data. Here is my picture from an afterschool educator lens:

Imagine walking into your usual afterschool space, you're excited about this new program that you just got trained in a few weeks ago. Its STEM Mentoring RI in association with Mystic Aquarium, which seems pretty cool. You're a little nervous because you are not a STEM expert, having grown up in this community, you likely never had access to a STEM program before so this is your first time with STEM, just like your youth that are about to walk in. Youth come in, and you allow them to pick a seat but you also go around and double check everyone is supposed to be there. Once you know everyone is where they are supposed to be, you do a basic introduction to yourself and STEM Mentoring, maybe the one that's in the book. Then you play the first warm up activity in the facilitator guide, you pass out supplies and facilitate the game but also participate so the youth can get to know you too.

Once the warm-up is done and you know your youth's names, its time to do the pre survey with every youth. You ask them to get on devices, help them log in and settle whatever other technical issues arise. You pass out their STEM ID one at a time as you give them the following directions: "navigate to stemmentoringri.com, click on communities, click on your community, and scroll down until you find the presurvey link. Click on it and it brings up the survey." While some youth are still struggling to pull up the survey, others are raising their hands and asking for help on the questions. By the time you get all the youth on the survey, you ask them to pause and you give them additional information in order to help them answer the questions they dont understand, like: 

            "What language do you speak at home?" _______________

To help you may say something like, "I am speaking English right now, some of you may speak Spanish at home, or Mandarin or a mix of multiple languages, please list all the languages you speak at home." You continue to go around and help youth read and understand the questions on the survey. If you're lucky, by the time all the youth are done, you play the game, do the experiment or watch a video from the facilitator guide before your first day at the STEM Mentoring program is over. 

What this picture tells me is our educators are focused on safety and fun. We know they try their hardest to adhere to programs and funders requests of data but there are times that programs are so chaotic that even the above example doesn't happen and data is either half-way collected, or not collected at all. In those moments of trying to support potentially 12-15 individual youth in their surveys, its stressful, an OST educator is learning in the moment the skills their youth have, who cant read, who cant comprehend, who is answering questions jokingly with their buddies etc. . So here are my new questions to this scenario and problem of changing our research:

1. If I change our research strategies, will they be implemented?
2. How do I get our afterschool and OST providers to see themselves as researchers? (is this even part of the problem?)
3. How do I get them to care about research?
4. How do I make the process to collect data equitable and inclusive for our youth and staff?
5. How do I make the process manageable/do-able for staff to conduct?
6. How do I still collect the information our funders and allies need while upholding our values?

Eve Tuck Reflection

 Suspending Damage by Eve Tuck

This letter by Eve Tuck was very informative but almost disappointing at the same time. The same issues brought up in the letter: climate change, rewarding deficit language and damage research, including/ lack there of, BIPOC at our tables and providing a space to actually hear their voices are all prevalent today, same as they were over a decade ago.

After our amazing discussion in class, I have one additional reflection and thought that has stuck with me. Leslie asked us the question, "can quantitative data be desire-based research?" while analyzing the 2 pages of a STEM report I provided the class. While we mostly agreed the report was desire-based, I realized I only provided a two page section with quantitative data. At the time, I thought no, and explained my reasoning that numbers cannot explain multiple stories or view points. After some thought though, I am reconsidering this. 

The two pages I provided of the STEM report consist of quantitative data and researcher knowledge in order to explain the results and reflect on the future goals of this particular STEM initiative. You can argue this means the two pages consisted of a combination of quantitative and qualitative data. I also think about A Girl Like Me video, it too consisted of quantitative research (while shown through video interviews, it also explained the results of the study they conducted). And the qualitative research shown through interviews with young black girls/women about their bodies, culture and experiences with society's expectation. 

Eve Tuck considers the video to be desire-based research. What shocked me was that I focused so much on associating desire-based research with positive and asset language, I forgot to really consider what truth-telling means. A Girl Like Me is truth telling, there aren't stories of positive and negative experiences of what it is like to be a black girl in America and the body standards imposed on them. Rather, what makes this video desire-based is its combination of studying black children and young black women. Not either or, but both.

I think desire-based research CAN be shown in quantitative data, A Girl Like Me didn't have to be a video but could have been a written report about the number of black children studied and young black women where the same questions were asked but the results were shown as numbers. I believe the author, Eve Tuck even mentioned that the Clark Doll test done in the 1940's had results most people are not privy to. While it was used in Brown v. Board of Education with a highlight of 3-5 year old black children preferring the white doll, what was not used was the earlier findings of the study where "white children aged three to five preferred black dolls... the trend reversed itself among black youth at 7, who preferred black dolls." The author goes on to explain other ways this study could have been used to acknowledge the complexity of self-worth and self-hatred. Instead, only select information was used from the study in order to promote damage. Was it worth it - yes, desegrated our schools! but lets understand the complexity of youth development and the affects racism has on our development in society. That would be desire-based research.

Coding Qualitative Data

 Maxwell: Designing a Qualitative Study

Negotiating a Research Relationship section stood out for me. Most of my studies involve my work so I constantly need to think about my relationship to others. For example, when we started the STEM initiative, I was doing observations as a way of collecting data. Because I am the statewide coordinator and manage the money flow, however, in some ways I am my sites' boss and/or funder. It took me sometime but I realized that because of this relationship, sites were nervous and viewed my presence as more of an observation/evaluation that their future programs depended on. Learning this relationship, I no longer conduct observations as they are not appropriate for me to do as their direct technical provider and "funder".

I have found doing interviews, focus group style with our youth is more effective. They are typically more comfortable in their space at their programs, and enjoy answering questions and telling stories surrounded by their friends.

Thinking about this section and the research that I want to do for our STEM initiative raises the questions, should others do the research for me, knowing my relationship to my sites and how they feel? Can I change my relationship with my sites/staff prior to my study, or is that impossible given my position of power in our dynamic?

An evaluation model: interview as method

 Excerpts from Systems of Care,  and Maxwell, Designing a Qualitative Study (215-232)

I'm glad that we took Maxwell's Designing a Qualitative Study in sections because it was a lot to read and take in. There are a couple of things I am beginning to understand more in depth:

1. Qualitative research is not highly respected amongst certain crowds of people. Which I find interesting when you take into consideration that the willingness to change more often comes from an emotional connection, feeling of inspiration and/or togetherness. Seeing and touching have a higher motivational imprint, therefore, as a researcher, if the purpose of your research was to inspire change based on new information, qualitative research would be more effective than quantitative.

I have experienced times when groups asked me for quantitative data, and while I complied they seemed uninterested or inspired by it. At the same time, strictly stories and experiences being shared were also dismissed as an individual experience, rather than a representation of a common issue. This is why I try to use both; to tug at the heart strings while backing up my stories with numerical facts. I would like to understand how to use these tools more effectively towards inspiring change.

2. The planning and set up for any study requires a lot of work but qualitative needs to be more fluid and flexible. When reading Maxwells introduction where he spoke about 2 models of design, the first question that arose for me was, do these 2 models of design require/allow for changing of the research question/s? I understand that the research question/s changing is common in qualitative research but he goes on to say, "Neither of these models adequately represents the logic and process of qualitative research". Just curious if research questions changing is more common in qualitative v. quantitative research.

Maxell makes qualitative research sound exhausting, change is exhausting and that's all he seems to speak about even while explaining design and presenting on different models and factors to consider in design. Its over whelming to think that you can spend a lot of time and effort designing a research study and still need to change multiple aspects of it in order to conduct an authentic and equitable study.

YDEV MA Capstone Reflection

 YDEV MA Capstone Projects Reflection

Looking at peoples past capstone projects was a lot. However, I appreciated all the different ways you could present a project, and the different topics and actions people took for their project. One of the reasons I selected the YDEV program was for the flexibility and opportunities for creativity. Seeing so many different projects and styles gives me hope that I can select a project that will benefit my work and MA. 

I feel a little nervous about how much time I will need to complete my capstone and being able to give myself that. I also feel excited and positive that I want to do my capstone around STEM Mentoring RI's data collection.

Journey to Praxis Pizza

 Journey to Praxis: Supporting Youth Activism - Research Pizza 

Research Question: "In urban communities: how do youth development workers engage adolescent youth in social justice activism?"

Type of Research: Qualitative

Ideology: Critical

Methods and tools: questionnaires, interviews, follow up interviews, observations, organizational artifacts

Analyzed: by participants, researcher and tools like NVIVO

Delivery: Article

Other notes and questions:

I found it interesting how the research had a specific timeline of August 2016 to February 2017 but the article wasn't published until 2023 - a 6 year difference since the research ended. This brought me to the conclusion that this article either took a long time to get published or it took along time to analyze the research. I'm curious about what the whole timeline was.

Page 51 mentions, "I engaged triangulation by making sure the codes and the claims in the research report were supported by (1) multiple sources of data and (2) data from different modes of collection that included interviews, observation and the review of organizational artifacts." This brought up a couple of questions for me:

• If you are conducting your own research, how do you use "multiple sources of data"? I understand that the report had other references but what if your research doesn't align with, or have similar outcomes to other sources? I understand that we are likely not reinventing the wheel of research but what happens when you get completely different outcomes to similar research?
• "Organizational artifacts" were mentioned a couple of times and examples of "promotional materials and information from organizational websites" were used. What is the process to using organizational artifacts? While other methods were outlined with a specific process in which the research was conducted, what is the process to utilizing promotional materials?

Overall, I appreciated the clarity of the article, identifying the steps to their research, which I understand is especially important to qualitative data. 

Ideologies of Research

 I did not find the videos very helpful. The metaphors and comparisons to characters from shows/movies made me more confused because I am not familiar with the references. I focused more on understanding Post Positivist but the extra research I tried to do made me more confused.

After our class discussion I realized there were a couple of things we thought were post positivist that were not characteristics of.  Putting the research ideologies in terms of how they are used in education helped a lot. I now understand that post positivist is very black and white and can be compared to typical classroom evaluations, testing, scoring schools and other common data collected from schools. This ideology only accepts the widely accepted truth and ignores any outside influences or other factors that could affect the research being done. Constructivist considers the knowledge of the researcher and the subjects. It accepts multiple realities, contexts and relations with other people; this could be focus groups, interviews and other methods that include the voices of all participants. Critical, as I understand it, is very similar to constructivist except that it takes research to the next step of action and encourages participants to lead change.

Understanding these ideologies of research, I know that I participate in all three, in my own work with STEM. We collect pre and post surveys that are very "black and white", as well as attendance and other demographic data for our funders that is typical post positivist research. However, I know my style is more constructivist, and with youth, can also be critical. The way I present data and go beyond the black and white to gain a deeper understanding of youth and our programs' experiences includes my participants and considers multiple realities. 

I think I would like to focus more on critical research for my capstone project by researching new ways of conducting our research methods with our participants and changing to more equitable practices.