Actively involve community members and study participants in the co-construction of research¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

The brief recommends that researchers move beyond studying communities to working with them, noting that "Researchers are increasingly engaging in efforts to actively involve community members and study participants in the co-construction of research." In the authors' study, this meant engaging district experts in the research process for a study of middle school math curricula and instruction, with the depth of engagement varying along a continuum and across research stages.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Researchers must make deliberate choices about how partners participate at each stage of the research process.

Constraints¶

• When the level of engagement with partners is relatively limited, the authors caution that translating findings into action-oriented recommendations requires special thoughtfulness.

Target Learners¶

• Education researchers, district leaders, and community partners

Target Learning Goals¶

• Conducting research-to-action partnerships that produce usable, actionable findings for policy and practice

Affordances¶

• Participant Engagement Continuum Research Process

Related Strategies¶

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Moira McCullough, Menbere Shiferaw. (2024). Navigating the gray spaces in research-to-action: Engaging partners in a cross-district study of middle school math curricula. Mathematica. https://www.mathematica.org/publications/navigating-the-gray-spaces-in-research-to-action