SECTIONS to a PROPOSAL

Title

1. Should indicate main elements of what is/was studied and the setting

ex. The relationship between self-esteem and aggressiveness among school children in New Hanover County

Include method (sampling, data collection technique, analysis technique) if important

2. Be concise but descriptive

3. Something catchy?

4. Keep a list of potential titles

 

Introduction

This section should be written to a lay audience (don’t use lingo). 

1. Identify a problem/need/issue.

2. Identify research question or goal (if known).

3. Explain why this topic is important to society. Who is it important to? General public, academics, activists, business owners, community leaders, politicians, families, parents, etc...  You can draw on lay literature here (published in non-academic outlets like newspapers, internet, popular magazines, etc..) – example: statistics reported in Newsweek, or at CNN.com

4. Describe history of the issue (if applicable).

5. Describe why/how you were drawn to this issue (if applicable).

6.  Identify how your proposal/report is organized – ie, introduce sections of document.

 

Organizational Profile

In this section you should introduce your reader to the organization that you will do/did your internship or practicum with.  Describe their mission/goals, leadership, departments, history, etc..  If you are working with a national organization, they probably have a website with much of this information on it.  Or you can obtain this info from your client/supervisor.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Goals of the lit review:

1.      Provide background to the problem/issue identified in Introduction section; What do we already know about this topic? Share with reader what you learned from reading research articles.

2.      Further clarify the research question or goals as identified in the Introduction section.

3.      Help reader understand why the proposed research strategy (to be described in Methods section) was selected.

It should not be an annotated bibliography. 

Only review articles which are related to your research question/project goal.

Use the literature review spreadsheet to help synthesize your literature and help write your review.

1.      In the first row, briefly describe the main topic of each article. Identify the research question or goal of the study/project. 


2.      In the second row, briefly describe the main theories or concepts used in the paper (if applicable).


3.      In the third row, briefly describe the sampling used in the study (if applicable)..  Did they use a sample? What kind? How many people? Response rate? If not a sample, what dataset did they use? What do you know about how the dataset was collected?


4.      In the fourth row, briefly describe the way the data was collected (if applicable).  Was it a survey, experiment, interview, observation study? What kinds of questions did they ask (measurement)? If an observation study, what did they try to observe? 


5.      In the fifth row, briefly describe the main findings/conclusions of the article.

6.      In the sixth row, briefly describe the main strenths and limitations of the study/project. Sometimes authors discuss these in their Discussion or Conclusion section. Sometimes they don’t, in which case you will need to identify these for yourself, based on your understanding of the study/project.



After you have filled out your spreadsheet,  you are ready to begin writing your review.  Make a subsection for each row that you have information filled in on.  In that subsection, summarize all the information you wrote in the cells for that row.  Identify similarities and differences on this subsection topic across the articles

 

METHODS or GOALS of YOUR PROJECT

Goal of this section: to identify and explain what you are going “to do” on the topic described in intro and lit review.

Need to identify your plan (the steps you will take) to accomplish your goal.

Two Layouts:

    1. If you are doing a research study  or data analysis.
    2. If you are not doing a research study  or data analysis, i.e. you are doing program development or are interning at an organization to learn about a particular occupation or industry. 

 

For Research Studies

Identify and describe the following:

  1. specific research question and hypotheses
  2. data collection techniques and why chose these methods
  3. sampling: who observed/interviewed/surveyed
  4. measurement: what questions will you ask or what behaviors will you look for during observation
    1. Ex. Concept = self-esteem, need to identify how measured; what questions will you ask to measure self-esteem, or what behaviors/events will you look for to indicate self-esteem
    2. Where did your questions/indicators come from? How developed?
  1. if observation or interview: how will you document your data (field notes, video, audio)
  2. length of data collection
  3. if qualitative or evaluation: role of researcher (what are the boundaries of your research)
    1. Need to identify your values and intellectual presumptions: Convince audience that you are aware of how you influence the study, the participants, the data collected and the answer formed

1.      Goal is to be aware of what you bring to the study (to critique the instrument (you))

2.      Researcher gender, race, age, etc.. that influence the study

3.      Researcher/participant gender, race, age, interactions that influence the study

4.      Previous experience with RQ, study setting, participants

  1. data analysis plans: Before designing study, anticipate what analysis you want to do and design a study that will ensure that you get the data you need for this analysis and that the data is good.
    1. What analysis planned: means tests, regression, descriptive stats, proportion tests
    2. What variables (questions) will be in the analysis
    3. Make a table: (see pg 84, Proposals that Work)
  1. Ethics: how confidentiality maintained, informed consent forms, IRB approval, identify possible harm/costs of participation in study, etc…
  2. Anticipate what could go wrong and how you will handle it
  3. Timeline for project
  4. Limitations of proposed methods
    1. Response bias
    2. Selection bias
    3. Researcher bias
    4. Ethical issues
    5. Assumptions made and effect on results/study
    6. Limits of generalizations

 

**Combined, the answers to numbers 1-12 above is called a “research design.”


For Projects other than Research/Analysis

Follow similar thinking as above, but rather than identifying how you are going to answer the research question, you identify how you will reach your goals. 

1. Identify Goals

            Describe each.

            Why are they your goals?

2.      For each goal, identify how you will reach it.

What steps will you take?  Be specific.

            Who will help?

            When will these steps be taken?  (Need a time line for the project.)

            Why will they help you reach goal (if not evident)?

3. Plans to evaluate goal attainment.

You need some way to determine if your goals were met.  Doesn’t need to be complicated. But your conclusion as to whether your goal was met or not needs to based on “measurable” data collected systematically.  

            See research design section for help.

4. Describe any expected limitations of your internship.

 

REFERENCES: list alphabetically

Author names. Year of publication. Article or Book Title. Journal name/ or publishing house (if book).

APPENDICES: diagram of research design, survey, interview guide, observation guide, informed consent forms, timeline of data collection, statistical model to be tested