Qual, Me? Maybe: An Autoethnographic Account of How Qualitative Enquiry Is Leveraged in STEM Education

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 5
  In Roundtable Session: Contributions to Qualitative Methodologies: Autonomy, Collective Power, and Autoethnography

Abstract

The qualitative tradition is one of the primary empirical traditions in social and educational research. Examining the trends following the use of qualitative research in STEM fields, we purpose this autoethnographic perspective poster exploring how the use of qualitative research is leveraged in our respective fields and how we conceptualize the qualitative tradition as researchers. Our conceptualization of STEM includes science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. For the sake of this investigation, we also include medicine and health sciences under the domain of science. Our auto- ethnographic perspective paper is guided by the primary research question: How do researchers in STEM fields rationale their use of qualitative methods in the research.

Authors

• Sreyoshi Bhaduri, McGraw-Hill

• Cherie D Edwards, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Cass McCall

• Cynthia Hampton, University of Colorado - Boulder