How Research Finds Its Way to Practice: A Multiple-Case Study of Research Brokerage

• In Event: The Challenges and Impacts of Research Use

Abstract

This project maps the complex network of actors, activities, and motivations within which research is exchanged, transformed, and communicated. Four cases were selected from purposefully sampled resources identified by school-based practitioners in a nationally survey of evidence use in education. Using an iterative, multi-phase approach, interview and survey data were analyzed from practitioners, brokers, and researchers who played an active role in using, developing, or sharing the selected resources. Findings highlight brokerage as a complex, contextualized process, but also reveal useful patterns. These patterns provide insights into where certain ‘leverage points’ exist to strengthen research use in education.

Authors

• Samantha Jo Shewchuk, University of Delaware

• Elizabeth N. Farley-Ripple, University of Delaware