Research Questions/ Variables and Ethics

In this assignment we have two parties.

PART I: Research Questions/ Variables

Scenario: Designing an Outcome Evaluation

The Board of Directors of a school asks you to evaluate the effectiveness of a program their organization runs called “Stay in School” that seeks to reduce the incidence of high school students dropping out of school. The program does this by having teachers administer a questionnaire to 10th graders during the fall semester of each year, and then using administrative data on individual student’s school attendance, grades and extra-curricular activities to identify students “at-risk” for dropping out. These so called at-risk youth are then given special counselling service during the course of the academic year aimed at preventing drop-out.

Please do the following:

1. Explain why we use research questions in our research. Develop no more than 3 research questions that would be appropriate for this outcome evaluation project. (20points)

2. Provide the definition of independent and dependent variables. (10points)

3. Identify the variables for the specific problem. (10 points)

4. Draw a visual causal diagram of the key dependent and independent variables might be. (20points)

5. Describe in detail a research design that would be appropriate it. (10 points.

Note: Please assume that you have any needed human subject approvals, and a big research budget.

PART II: Ethics

6. Consider the following ethical dilemmas that may face a researcher. Describe ways you might anticipate the problem an actively address in your research proposal. (30points)

Problem: A researcher on your team copies sentences from another study and incorporates them into the final written report of your project. What do you do?