Graduate students must complete a research project to receive their degree. In addition to this basic requirement, the student may be required to submit a research proposal and application to the governing Institutional Review Board (IRB) for approval prior to beginning the research project. This article describes the IRB process and offers tips…

Policy and practice in child welfare and protection has been significantly influenced by public inquiries or commissions which follow highly publicised child tragedies. Whilst there has been considerable comment on the final reports, there has been little research on the evidence gathered for such inquiries. Large amounts of testimony are…

This book is the annual report of the Foundation for Educational Research (Stichting Voor Onderzoek Van Het Onderwijs--SVO) of the Netherlands. Chapter 1 is an introduction which explains SVO's part in educational research, while chapter 2 discusses the general affairs of the SVO. In chapter 3 SVO activities are described. They include (1) project…

This paper discusses the need for educational researchers to employ a system for protecting human subjects who participate in research and development programs. The ethical obligations of researchers, as well as the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare's policy guidelines, are examined. Following this discussion, the author describes the…

This guidebook is intended to help researchers apply for funds for research projects in distance education through the Distance Education Council of Indira Gandhi National Open University (India). The stated intent of this guidebook is to encourage system-based research; to promote in-depth studies to evaluation programs, their impact, and their…

The history of the Committee on the Status of Black Americans of the National Research Council is described. Its assignments are: (1) to collect data describing the changing position of blacks in America since 1940; (2) to describe the cultural context of those changes; and (3) to explore consequences of initiatives to ameliorate the position of…

In Canada's Exemplary Schools Project, a national committee designed and coordinated 21 case studies. A committee member recounts decisions made about design and method, and highlights differences between method and methodology, as well as variations in conceptualization of qualitative research. Discusses the meaning of "exemplary,"…

This article describes the development of the Head Start Mental Health Research Consortium, a research partnership between the Administration on Children, Youth and Families and the National Institute of Mental Health. The Consortium is designed to assess mental health needs of low-income children and optimal approaches for addressing these needs.…

Canada's Exemplary Schools Project, a study of 21 secondary schools nationwide, involved continual tension between the need for a coherent and shared national research approach and the need to allow local variation and initiative. A member of the national coordinating committee explores how this tension affected research design and the writing of…