Data-Sharing Routines in a Research-Practice Partnership

• In Event: Advancing Research-Practice Partnerships: Leveraging the Positionality of Graduate Student Researchers

Abstract

Purpose:

The goal of this study is to outline the routines for identifying, presenting, and reflecting on data for improvement with school partners at different capacities in a research-practice partnership (RPP). Few studies have examined how organizational and individual roles impact partners’ adoption of findings from partnership (for exceptions, see Farrell, Harrison, & Coburn, 2019). In addition, there is little work on how data interpretation affects role negotiation within an RPP. This study examines: How did roles affect partners’ data interpretation? How did actors within the partnership negotiate their roles within the RPP? In particular, what role did the graduate student play in facilitating the partnership, under the faculty guidance?

Theoretical Framework:

Role Negotiation. Decisions on how to act and what roles to take are grounded in individuals’ understanding of their own identities and their organizations (Whetten, 2006). RPP participants may change their roles and actions once they better understand their partners’ roles and reshape their organizational identities in emerging contexts (Farrell et al., 2019).

Sensemaking. The interpretation of the present situation stems from past experiences and beliefs (Coburn, 2001). Individuals construct mental models of causal relationships to make predictions and theories of action in other situations (Spillane & Miele, 2007). Together, the literature on sensemaking and role negotiation helped us understand how partners recall their roles and experiences to make causal attributions and improvement plans when facing data in an RPP.

Methods and Data Sources:

The study presents an RPP with an urban, middle school in California. Researchers established a meeting routine with the school principal. School connectedness and English language development were jointly negotiated as problems of practice. Data from the partnership research were presented to the school in separate meetings, first with the principal, then instructional leaders and the whole school. The study drew from observation notes and audiotape of meetings and teacher-generated notes. Codes for role negotiation and sensemaking (Bertrand & Marsh, 2015; Farrell et al., 2019) were adapted.

Findings:

Roles Influenced Data Sensemaking. Data interpretation and intentions for action depended on the participants’ assumptions for data purposes (i.e., informative versus evaluative), level of involvement in schoolwide improvement efforts, and familiarity with the RPP.

Role Negotiation. There was ongoing negotiation to build agency from each participant. Teachers voiced issues of trust in the data’s validity if they were not involved in the study design. To alleviate tensions around teachers’ receptiveness, the principal created a space for dialogue between a group of teachers and researchers. The researchers shifted their position to engage teachers in the codesign process. The graduate student researcher actively reached out to teacher participants for resources, planning, and feedback.

Significance:

There has been research on data sharing routines in RPPs. However, this study is unique as it highlights the importance of facilitating agency and sensemaking, beyond district or school’s agreement for data exchange. The study contributes to the literature on data sensemaking, most of which has focused on evaluations of academic outcomes instead of informal teacher work with data through partnership approaches.

Author

• Ha Nguyen, University of California - Irvine