2550 R&P

RESEARCH

2550 R&P

Individuals and/or agencies wishing to conduct research in the Wake County Public School System shall comply with the rules and procedures described below. It is the intent of these rules and procedures to provide a framework within which individuals and/or agencies and the Wake County Public School System may operate in conducting research in the Wake County Public School System.

“Research” shall be defined, for the purposes of these procedures, as any data collection from Wake County Public School System students or staff, including, but not limited to, interviews, videotaping, and surveys of staff or students; use of existing data such as test scores, attendance, grades, or demographic information; and observations when the information gathered will be aggregated and used as data. These procedures do not include data collection by Wake County Public School System staff as part of their job responsibilities; e.g., climate surveys by school improvement teams, test data gathered by teachers or administrators to evaluate instructional programs, data collected by the Long Range Planning staff to comply with state mandates for reporting, and evaluation data collected by program or evaluation and research staff.

Requests to conduct research in the Wake County Public School System shall be made in writing to the assistant superintendent for evaluation and research on specific forms established for this application. The information in the application will include, at a minimum:

1.

Statement of the research problem.

2.

A description of the methodology.

3.

A management plan outlining the major steps required to conduct the research.

4.

Copies of all research data gathering instruments and parent permission slips.

5.

A description of data analysis procedures.

The assistant superintendent for evaluation and research shall review each request on an individual basis and shall obtain recommendations from other staff when appropriate. The assistant superintendent shall approve or disapprove the request on the basis of one or more of the following criteria:

1.

Adequate information is provided in the application.

2.

The research problem and/or methodology is not likely to be viewed as controversial by a significant segment of the school system's clients and/or patrons.

3.

The research problem, methodology, and/or management plan provides adequate safeguards against individual rights as provided in the "Family Rights and Privacy Act."

4.

The research problem, methodology, and/or management plan does not require staff and/or students to be inordinately involved, thereby providing reasonable grounds for inferring that the research will not interfere with the teaching-learning cycle to the detriment of the students.

5.

The research problem shows promise of providing useful information to practitioners in the field.

6.

The methodology is appropriate and adequate to the problem.

7.

The qualifications of the researcher appear to be adequate for successfully conducting the activities.

8.

The management plan appears to provide the necessary assurances for successful resolution of the problem.

9.

The data gathering instruments and/or the data analysis procedures are appropriate to a successful resolution of the problem.

Researchers whose requests are approved must further agree to:

1.

Join with the assistant superintendent and/or his/her designee for purposes of developing a monitoring plan which shall provide assurances that planned activities are carried out as specified in the application and plan. Deviations from the plan must receive prior approval. Building principals will be designees for portions of the study conducted in their buildings and shall ensure compliance by the researcher.

2.

Provide the school system with a copy of the final results and be willing to make a presentation of his/her results to an audience of interested colleagues.

Refusal to comply with "1" and "2" above will result in a decision to deny permission to conduct research.

Issued: November 1, 1979

Revised: July 12, 1992