Online Class - March 31
A fun and interactive learning experience!
Rethinking Your Research Process
Movie Time!
Here is what you will need to plan for the assignment:
Old Research Purpose
New Research Purpose
Plan Your Research
Relax...Here's an Example of What You Need to Do
Context
As an example, I'm imagining that I did a feasibly study on how to run a successful crowdsourcing campaign for a specific Montana Tech project. Although I already conducted some interviews, read a few articles, and analyzed the characteristics of the top earners on three crowdsourcing sites, I now know a systematic review requires a different type of research. As a result, I need to find every published article about crowdsourcing that's available on the Montana Tech Library journal database.Original Purpose (Research Question) for a Feasibility Study
The purpose of this study is to determine if it's feasible for Montana Tech students to run a crowdfunding campaign to create a food delivery service on campus.
Revised Purpose (Research Question) for a Systematic Review
The purpose of this study is to determine the common characteristics of successful crowdsourcing campaigns run by students.
Keyword Search Terms
I need to search for and collect reference information and abstracts for all articles related to successful college (campus) crowdsourcing. To do this, I will use at least the following three keyword searches:
- "crowd sourcing" and "college students"
- "crowd funding" and "campus projects"
- "kickstarter" and "college"
Narrowing Criteria
I expect to find hundreds of articles using my keyword searches, but I know I don't have time to read all of those articles. Once I have conducted my initial searches, I plan to narrow the number of relevant articles by reviewing the abstracts and removing the following:
- articles published more than five years ago
- articles not related to college (campus) fundraising
- articles about fundraising in countries other than the United States
- articles related to colleges with more than 10,000 students
Explain Your Criteria
I would expect my narrowing criteria to reduce the number of articles from hundreds (if not thousands) to less than 100. Then I might come up with some narrowing criteria to reduce the number even further. Because I'm interested in crowdsourcing at Montana Tech, I've decided to eliminate articles related to large campuses (more than 10,000 students) and campuses in other countries. Also, because crowdsourcing has changed so much in recent years, I've decided to eliminate any articles published more than five years ago. I am only interested in online crowdsourcing projects. My goal is to narrow my results so that I have a comprehensive collection of articles that are related to college students running effective, online crowdsourcing campaigns for small (less than 10,000 student) campuses in the United States.
Finally...Be Ready to Discuss Each Other's Posts
Even though you worked in teams, I expect team members to have very different ideas about how they would approach their projects if they were conducting systematic reviews. You should create your own individual responses. You will be able to see responses from everyone in class once you submit your answers. Be ready to discuss your responses and the responses of others when we meet in class.
Do Your Assignment - Let's Get This Done!
Contact Me
Email: bwatts@mtech.edu
Location: Butte, MT, United States
Phone: 4064902032