But, now I think Karl's post might lead me to the answer. The purpose of these projects is to teach them research skills NOT to contribute generalizable knowledge. I need to review our university policies more carefully, but I think that if I can show that even though data is collected outside of the classroom, the intent is educational in nature, and not one of contributing to generalizable knowledge, then I should be able to by-pass the IRB process.
This ties to the original post in that I have my students do presentations in-class and they do not present their findings outside of the class. If presentations where to occur outside of class then the results could be viewed as contributing to generalizable knowledge since the findings are being shared beyond the class setting. For the students involved, the presentation experience remains one of learning, but for those that are attending the presentation who are not enrolled in the course, it becomes an event where they can gain knowledge based on the studies being presented. Hence, the presentations are now contributing to generalizable knowledge and the class projects become classified as research and subject to IRB review. At least I could see that by some interpretations, though I'm not sure I fully agree with it.
A search of my own on the web for "generalizable knowledge" turned up some other websites people might find useful in addition to the one Karl mentions below. Most, if not all, of the sites I found do stress the importance of the faculty supervisor to keep a close eye on the class projects and to ensure that all ethical guidelines are followed. Here is a brief list of some of the websites I found:
http://sumweb.syr.edu/osp/human_policy.html (See the sections on What Constitutes
Research? and Student Class Projects. This is perhaps one of the best I found
that specifically addresses courses that teach research methodology and the
purpose of class projects.)
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/DoR/rph/7-3.html (Talks about Research Practica, i.e.
student projects designed "to provide research training")
http://www.ors.duke.edu/irb/student%20research.htm (Discussion of Research
Practica at Duke and that class projects are not typically designed to contribute
to generalizable knowledge)
http://www.iupui.edu/~resgrad/Human%20Subjects/ethics5C.html (also addresses
the issue of class projects typically not being designed to contribute to
generalizable knowledge.)
http://www.umbc.edu/irb/faq3.htm (definitions of research with discussion of the
distinction between educational intent and intent to contribute to generalizable
knowledge... of note here is the fact that once the intent moves beyond the
"pedagogic context" it stops being educational in intent. Some might interpret
this as "moving beyond the classroom", however in my mind even outside of the
classroom the intent is still pedagogic in nature.)
Thanks again to Karl for setting me along this path and I hope this helps someone else who is having to deal with IRB woes...
- Marc
At 11:04 PM 3/5/2003 -0500, you wrote:
Here I quote from the material that has been used at many institutions for training researchers to be IRB pure:
"If an evaluation systematically gathers data and contributes to generalizable knowledge, or if the results are going to be published, the activity is typically classified as research. If the results stay entirely in-house and are used for administrative purposes only, many institutions do not consider it research."
If you search the net for the phrase "generalizable knowledge," you will find many documents involving IRBs and regulations on research activities. You might find interesting the one at http://www.rfcuny.org/ResCompliance/Student_Research.html , which explicitly addresses student research.
I wonder if one could argue that data collection with a idiographic rather than nomothetic focus is not "research" since it is not intended to be generalizable across time and context.
Karl W.
====================== G. Marc Turner, MEd, Network+, MCP Instructor & Computer Coordinator Dept of Psychology (http://www.psych.swt.edu) Southwest Texas State University [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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