One of the fundamental purposes of educational research is to provide evidence to facilitate effective practice. However, the evidence itself does not have much value for practitioners unless key information about the context from which the evidence was generated is also provided. In this paper, we use the word 'context' to refer to factors that…

Coburn and Turner (this issue) present an intriguing framework for understanding how data has come to be used in the current high accountability environments in education. In this framework, they connect various processes of data use within organizational and political contexts. Data use is presented using an ecological perspective that deepens…

This paper examines the meaning of "rural" in rural education research and the relationship of this meaning to the research project's design and purpose. In traditional, comparative research designs, "rural" becomes a part of research that involves or implies comparisons with the nonrural. In contrast, emergent, interpretive…