Research-Practice Partnerships: Building Evidence Together Through Productive Friction

• In Event: Collaboration, Community, and Critique: Seeking Wisdom Within School, University, and Community Research

Abstract

The study, qualitative with a grounded theory design, draws on a cultural-historical account of learning across boundaries and conceptualizations of research alliances as joint work at boundaries. A research-practice partnership (RPP) in a large Midwest city, between a State University (SU), an urban school district (USD), and the American Institute for Research (AIR), studied the relationship between school climate factors and the students’ academic outcomes. Inquiry: How do the participants in the partnership experience the process of boundary-crossing through CHAT’s concept of activity system? And, what experiences provide a space for productive friction and enhanced professional activity? The concept of productive friction was generated, and differences in viewpoints are looked at more as opportunities than challenges for RPPs’ success.

Author

• Regina J Giraldo-Garcia, Ball State University