valuating Student Experiences & Perceptions of their Progress Fiona Whelan - Ryan (PhD Student - Education) Supervisor: Professor Sarah Moore - University of Limerick
Introduction This study is concerned with evaluating student experiences and perceptions of progress early in their third level educational experience. The overarching aim of this study is to investigate how a student’s choice of programme for third-level education, and the subsequent programme they are offered influences their experiences and perceptions of their progress therein. Research Objectives The main research objectives of this study include: 1) To identify the main internal and external influencers on student “choice” of programme of study, namely students in year 1 of the Bachelor of Business (Level 8) Hons Programme; 2) To explore how choice of programme (and where that choice was ranked) impacts on the student's performance/progression and success rates; 3) To evaluate domains of learning (cognitive, affective & psychomotor factors) that influence student progression and academic success.
Cognitive Factors
Student Progression
External Influencers
Student “Choice(s)”
Decision Making
Ontological Position My ontological position is interpretivist which ‘sees education as a lived experience for those involved in educational processes and institutions. Its form of reasoning is practical; it aims to transform the consciousness of practitioners and, by so doing, aims to give them grounds upon which to decide how to change themselves.’ (Carr and Kemmis, 1986, p.219). Epistemological Position My ontological position is one where knowledge is socially constructed. ‘Epistemologically, constructivism emphasises the subjective interrelationship between the researcher and the participant, and the co-construction of meaning’ (Pidgeon and Henwood, 1997 cited in Mills et al., 2006, p.26).
Decision(s)
Student Experiences
Internal Influencers
Research Paradigm A research paradigm ‘consists of the following components: A) Ontology, B) Epistemology, C) Methodology, and D) Methods’ (Scotland 2012, p.9)
Student Success
Psychomotor Factors
Research Design and Methodology Constructivist Grounded Theory • Interpretive approach to qualitative research (Charmaz, 2005). • Dependent on the researcher’s view and the depth of learning about situations and relationships. • Emphasis is on views, values and beliefs of individuals rather than on the methods of research; although practices of gathering rich data still remains important (Creswell, 2007). Informed Grounded Theory refers to ‘a product of a research process as well as to the research process itself, in which both the process and the product have been thoroughly grounded in data by GT methods while being informed by existing research literature and theoretical frameworks’ (Thornberg, 2012, p249). It incorporates both the researcher’s perspectives and prior knowledge (Dey, 1999).
For additional information, please contact: Fiona Whelan-Ryan (
[email protected]) Dept. of Management & Organisation, School of Business, Cork Rd. Waterford.
Affective Factors
Phenomenological Approach My overall research approach is phenomenological as it will describe in a meaningful way the ‘lived experiences’ (for 12 participants over 2 years) of the early years of college life (Creswell, 2007). As a phenomenological researcher, I suggest that my research needs to be conducted and represented in a manner that does justice to phenomena as they are experienced by the people living them. As a researcher, I will be subjectively interpreting and co-constructing the participants’ views, experiences and perceptions of their respective journeys from deciding on their proposed programme of study, through to their first two years at third level. Overall Approach The objective is to rely on participants’ views of situations and their meanings of their world and understand their historical and cultural backgrounds through an interactive process in which I will use open-ended questions to seek to understand their lives better.
Methodology Phase One: A self-administered questionnaire furnished to all Year One Bachelor of Business Studies Students (Level 8) within first semester. Phase Two: 12 Year One Bachelor of Business Studies Students (Level 8) volunteers to participate in an in-depth interview (one per semester, over four semesters). Analysis Constructivist Grounded theory approach (Charmaz, 2008) and NVivo Software to assist in documentation, memoing & analysis. Validity & Reliability – Trustworthiness & Reflexivity Trustworthiness includes four criteria: credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability (Lincoln and Guba, 1985 in Seale, 2002; Shenton and Hay-Gibson, 2009; Tracy, 2010) & will be ensured by adopting an interpretive coding strategy.
References: Bloom,B.S., Mesia, B.B. and Krathwohl, D.R. (1956) Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, the classification of educational goals Handbook I: Cognitive Domain and Handbook II: Affective Domain, New York: Addison Wesley. Carr, W. and Kemmis, S. (1986) Becoming Critical: Education, Knowledge and Action Research, East Sussex: The Falmer Press Charmaz, K. (2005) ‘Grounded theory: Objectivist and Constructivist methods’, In Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (Eds.), Strategies for Qualitative Enquiry, Second Edition, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Creswell, J.W. (2007) Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design: Choosing Among Five Approaches, London: Sage Publications. Dey, I. (1999) Grounding Grounded Theory, San Diego: Academic Press. Lincoln, Y.S. and Guba, E. (1985) Naturalistic Inquiry, Beverly Hills, California: Sage. Pidgeon, N. and Henwood, K. (1997) ‘Using Grounded Theory in Psychological Research’, In Hayes, N. (Ed.), Doing Qualitative Analysis in Psychology, 115-141, Hove, UK: Psychology Press. Shenton, A.K. and Hay-Gibson, N. (2009) ‘Dilemmas and further debates in qualitative method’, Education for Information, 27, 21-37. Thornberg, R. (2012) ‘Informed Grounded Theory’, Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 56 (3), 243 – 259. Tracy, S.J. (2010) ‘Qualitative Quality: Eight “Big-Tent” Criteria for Excellent Qualitative Research”, Qualitative Inquiry, 16 (10), 837-851.
