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Tips on Preparing a Successful Educational
Research ProposalFiona Fui-Hoon Nah, professor, BIT
Nancy J. Stone, professor and chair, Psychological Science
Diane Hagni, CERTI
March 7, 2014
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Data about the mini-grant program
• 20 projects funded since spring 2011• Projects from 11 departments• Five team projects• Two awardees received multiple grants• 52% of awardees are tenure-track; 48%
non-tenure-track• Awardees have ranged from lecturers to
Curators’ Professors
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Data about the mini-grant program
• Average award is $3,171; minimum awarded, $500, and maximum, $7,500, for a multi-disciplinary project
• Five projects had matching funds from their departments or other sources
• Go here for suggested areas of focus
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Resources on CERTI site
http://certi.mst.edu/educationalresearch/
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Comparison of grant programsGrant Program
Administered by Amount of funding
Focus of Program
Timeline for 2014
Other information
Educational Research Mini-Grants
Center for Educational Research and Teaching Innovation (CERTI); funding through Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
Range from $1,000-$10,000; average award amount is $3,000-$4,000 for single PI project; one year project
Funding to promote teaching scholarship in the classroom – supporting projects that examine and improve teaching and learning practices
Letter of intent due – March 14; Proposal due – April 14;Awards announced in May; Funding released in May 2014 (50%) and at end of project, August 31, 2015 (50%)
Presentation required at S&T Teaching and Learning Technology Conference Educational Research Symposium in mid-March (latter part of grant cycle). For more information about the program, go to http://certi.mst.edu/educationalresearch/
eFellows grants
Educational Technology Office; funding through Provost’s office
3 tiers -- full course redesign ($5,000); step redesign ($2,000); teaching with technology ($1,000). These are one-year to three-semester projects
Funding to redesign courses for blended or fully online delivery using best pedagogical practices to improve student learning
Program Participation Workshops – March 20 and April 3;Letter of intent due – April 25;Proposal due – June 27;Awards announced – Aug. 15
Participation required in the eLearning Community of Practice three times per semester. Faculty will work with instructional designers on course redesign. For more information about the program, go to http://edtech.mst.edu/elearning/efellows/
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What is educational research?
• A systematic process for understanding learning and teaching effectiveness – i.e., applying the scientific method
• A means to uncover the processes and interactions underlying learning and teaching, such as– Motivation– Acquisition of knowledge– Presentation of material– Impact of environment and interaction
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General suggestions
• Be sure to follow directions closely• Be clear and specific
– Consider your audience– Justification – Research question– Procedure– What are you measuring? How will you measure it?– IRB (http://irb.mst.edu/)
• Social and behavioral science
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Research question/statementNot specific or measurable
• Students will be better learners.
Specific and measurable
• Providing video demos with the lab instructions (i.e., specific intervention) will help students to improve their lab test scores (i.e., specific and measurable outcome[s]).
Students who receive <intervention> will achieve higher <outcomes – e.g., test scores> than students without <intervention>.
Hypothesis
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Research strategy / assessmentNon-specific or unclear
• Students may incorporate the intervention and then provide feedback regarding the intervention.
Specific with adequate details
• An experimental study will be used to test the intervention where students will be randomly assigned to one of the two experimental conditions - <control condition – i.e., without intervention> and <treatment condition – i.e., with intervention>.
• Followed by research procedures and assessment details
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Measuring outcomesNon-specific or unclear
• Student feedback will be gathered and assessed.
Specific with adequate details
• Satisfaction with the course will be assessed using the measurement items in Eastman et al. (2011) that were adapted from Oliver (1993). [Validated measure]
OR• We will develop our own
measures for assessing Satisfaction with the course to more specifically assess the unique aspects of the course. [“Homemade” measure]
Note: It would be helpful to review existing validated measures in the literature and adapt from them in developing your homemade measure.
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Summary• Format (see call for proposals for more info)
– A brief abstract (100 words)– Purpose of project
• Motivation and significance of research project
– Pertinent information about your class (anticipated student enrollment, number of sections taught, etc.)
– Research question to be addressed• Clear educational research question/statement• Hypothesis/Hypotheses (preferred/recommended)
– Learning outcomes to be addressed• Be specific
– Methodology• Research design (e.g., experiment, survey, case study – can be combination)• Research procedures• Measurement of outcomes
– Evaluation and feedback• How will you document success and show how project objectives are achieved
– Budget with justification– Deliverables