Planning and Managing the project

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Planning and Managing the project

• Nigel King
• University of Huddersfield

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• Thanks to Siobhan Hugh-Jones and Kathy Kinmond
  for contributing material for this presentation

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Outline

• Choosing a research topic
• Developing a research question
• Ethical issues
• Planning
• The supervisory relationship

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Identifying a research topic

• Students need to ask themselves
• Is there something about which I am passionate?
• Is there relevant literature on the topic?
• Can the topic be researched at undergraduate
  level?
• ACTIVITY In small groups spend 5 minutes
  discussing what might make a topic inappropriate
  for an undergraduate qualitative project

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Warning signs re research topics

• Not well-suited to qualitative approach
• Practical difficulties in researching at UG level
• e.g. highly sensitive, difficult to access
  participants, highly complex
• Does not fit with institutional constraints on
  project module
• e.g. time available, compulsory milestones
• ???

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Developing the research question

• ACTIVITY Consider the following questions. Would
  you be happy with these for an undergraduate
  qualitative project? How could you change any
  youre not happy with to make them more
  appropriate? Discuss for 15 minutes.
• What is the experience of living with diabetes?
• Do children sent to day-care have problems?
• Are girls more affected by magazine images of
  perfect bodies than boys?
• How do football fans using online message boards
  account for their teams poor performance?

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• A strong research question should....
• Be as specific as possible about the sample
• Pass the so what? test
• Be coherent with the methodological approach
  taken
• Be concerned with meaning/experience, rather than
  cause and effect
• Others?

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Key ethical principles

• Need to ensure students cover key ethical
  principles
• Informed consent
• Confidentiality
• Avoiding harm
• Use of deception
• Right to withdraw
• Identify particular issues re. these for
  qualitative research

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• Ensure students are aware of and help them
  negotiate institutional ethical procedures
• And where appropriate external ethics procedures
• Emphasise that ethics is not a hoop to be jumped
  but should inform their practice throughout the
  project
• Take opportunities to highlight this in course of
  project
• See chapters on ethics and qualitative research
  in Forrester (ed.) (2010) and Sullivan, Gibson
  and Riley (eds.) (2012)

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Planning a final year project

• ACTIVITY In small groups spend 15 minutes
  discussing the question assigned to you from
  those below
• Why does planning matter?
• Can a project evolve?
• Should students be forced to plan?
• What are students typically worried about at
• project start?
• when the project is underway?
• project end?
• What do students typically underestimate in
  conducting qualitative projects?

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Types of planning

• Conceptual and practical planning
• Conceptual planning relates to the academic
  coherency of the work.

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Conceptual planning

• What are my research question(s)?
• Why is my study important?
• What has been done before?
• What are the gaps in the literature that my
  project will address?
• What research method will best let me answer my
  research question(s)?
• Who are my participants and what is my
  recruitment strategy? Or in the case of already
  existing data, what is my data corpus?

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Practical planning

• What deadlines does the student need to meet?
• What work needs doing to meet each of these?
• Is it dependent on anyone else?
• E.g. permissions to access participants,
  technical assistance, loan of equipment
• Planning tools may be useful e.g. Gannt Charts
• But note that qualitative projects are often less
  linear in how they progress than quantitative

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Project needs

• Planning should include consideration of
  information, support and resource needs.

Needs About Who / what supports the need Student aware of need at start of project?
Information needs Literature Appling for ethical approval Data collection Method of analysis etc Library Supervisors handbook etc
Support needs Deciding on RQ Developing method of data collection Technical support etc etc
Resources needs Introductory texts on methods? Training in interview methods? Audio recording equipment etc etc
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Planning the method

• What should students consider?
• What methods have been used in previous, similar
  studies?
• Is it appropriate to reproduce or challenge them?
  
• What other methods do they know about and what
  are their potential uses?
• What resources do these different methods require
  (including time) and do they have access to them?
• What is their access to suitable participants?

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The student-supervisor relationship

• ACTIVITY In small groups spend 10 minutes
  discussing the question assigned to you from
  those below
• What should your students expect from you as a
  supervisor?
• What should you expect from your students as a
  supervisor?
• What can you do as supervisor to really mess up
  your students projects?

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The supervisors side of the bargain

• How often will you meet?
• How long will meetings last?
• Will you be available outside of scheduled
  meeting times? If so, how?
• What level of comment will you give on drafts of
  the dissertation?
• How much notice do you need to comment on draft
  material?

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The students side of the bargain

• Turn up on time
• Give good notice of inability to attend a
  scheduled meeting
• Send material to be read by the supervisor in
  accordance with agreed deadlines
• Let the supervisor know of problems that might
  affect the project as early as possible
• Make notes during/after meetings of what youve
  agreed to do

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How to be a really bad supervisor

• Disengaging
• Dont bother remembering what the project is
  about, or where the student is up to in it
• Give vague generic advice
• Fail to read work you asked them to send you
• Over-controlling
• Tell the student exactly what to research and how
• Set the timetable without consulting the student

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• Uninformed
• If a student is using an approach or method with
  which you are unfamiliar, dont bother learning
  anything about it
• or asking for help from a colleague who does
  know about it
• Intellectually dishonest
• Use your students as unpaid and unacknowledged
  research assistants
• If it turns out well, publish their work as your
  own