- Guilford County Schools
- Internal Research Process
Research and Evaluation
Page Navigation
-
Internal Research Review Process Instructions for Applicants
Introduction
Guilford County Schools (CGS) is committed to the support of educational research that protects the best interests of its students, families, staff and the district as a whole. Research is a process of focused inquiry with the goal of increasing understanding of some phenomenon. In order to ascertain this knowledge, collection of data through interviews, surveys, and observations is typically required. The data collection process requires time and effort from the people and institutions from which the data is collected and has potentially significant privacy concerns. As such, GCS makes efforts to minimize the time required of participants in approved research and strives to protect participants’ privacy.
Internal research is defined as research completed by current Guilford County Schools employees without external partners (e.g., universities, graduate student research, nonprofit or other organization-led research, etc.) but that is intended for publication. Internal research is considered to be part of the employees’ work within GCS and, as such, rights to such research belong to GCS. Research completed with the intention of publication in journals, books, websites, conferences, etc., must be reviewed by the Research Review Committee and approval to seek publication of the research must be obtained by the Research Review Committee before submission for publication. Research that is conducted as a typical, standard function of one’s job responsibilities (e.g., completing a needs assessment of staff within a department you manage, surveying students at one's own school, completing observations of teachers as a principal, reviewing academic records of students in your classroom, etc.) does not require approval from the GCS Research Review Committee but may require supervisor approval.
Application Process
To apply for internal research approval, the following components must be completed:
- The application web form must be completed, including the following:
- Researcher name(s) and position(s) within the district
- A brief summary (1-2 paragraphs) of the purpose of the research
- A description of the intended use of the research findings (e.g., improvement of internal processes, publication in journals, evaluating programs, etc.) (1-2 paragraphs)
- A description of research methodology including a description of proposed participants, required time commitments of staff, students, and/or parents
- A proposed timeline for completion of the research
- The following must be e-mailed to reuttek@gcsnc.com
- A copy (if applicable) or description of instruments (e.g., surveys, interview questions, observation forms, etc.)
- A proposed consent form
Internal researchers may contact the GCS Research Review Committee at reuttek@gcsnc.com to discuss their future projects, in terms of feasibility, GCS research policy questions, and for discussions of what types of supplementary materials will be needed.
Consent Forms
Research projects which intend to include data from students, parents, or staff must solicit informed consent from its participants. All staff or parent participants must complete consent forms. All parents or legal guardians of student participants under the age of 18 must also complete a consent form. Students 6th grade or above must also complete assent forms written in developmentally appropriate language. All electronic survey instruments must also include a re-affirmation (or reminder) of consent prior to beginning the survey.
Consent forms must include the following elements:
- The purpose of the research
- Expected duration of participation and procedures that will be followed by participants
- That participation is voluntary and may be revoked at any time. (note: students in Pre-K to 5th grade whose parents/guardians have signed consent forms must also be told verbally that their participation is voluntary, and they must be allowed to opt out at any time, although assent forms are not required)
- Any foreseeable consequences of declining or withdrawing (if any)
- Any prospective research benefits
- Limits to confidentiality
- Incentives for participation
- Whom to contact for questions about the research and participants’ rights
Notification of Acceptance/Denial
Applicants will receive a formal acceptance or denial letter once the Research Review Committee completes its review process. Approval indicates that the researcher has permission from Guilford County Schools to conduct research within the confines of the methodology and timeline that was proposed and approved. The GCS Research Review Committee must be immediately informed of any changes to the approved proposal, and must approve these changes before the project continues.
Approval does not imply a requirement for school administrators to agree to participate, or to require their staff or students to participate. Individual administrators have the right to refuse participation in district-approved research projects, and their decisions are final.
Review Criteria
Guilford County Schools processes research requests through a Research Review Committee, whose members are both experts in research and various aspects of the district.
The following criteria are used by the RRC when reviewing all projects:
- Research ethics and bias: Research applications with ethical problems or that do not include all necessary protections for participants (e.g., consent/assent forms, clear description of risks, explanation of incentives) will be rejected. In addition, research with a high potential for bias (e.g., completing interviews with colleagues) is likely to be rejected.
- Feasibility of implementation: Research whose methodology is unlikely or impossible to implement (e.g., if the requestor lacks the resources to complete the research as written, or if the number of participants exceeds reasonable expectations, or occurs outside the scope of practicality) is generally rejected by the RRC.
- Risk and intrusion: Research applications involving gathering intimate details from students, parents, or staff (e.g., mental or physical health, sexual orientation, political party support, wealth, etc.) is generally rejected by the RRC. Likewise, any methodology that involves more than negligible risk to participants will be rejected by the RRC.
- Benefit to GCS: Research conducted within Guilford County Schools must have a direct benefit to the students, parents, and/or staff within the system. If similar data is already being collected within GCS, the RRC may reject the proposal or may offer applicant access to the data already collected. The RRC requires that all approved research submit summary documents (e.g., reports, papers, etc.) after research is concluded.
- Cost of participation: Both physical resources (e.g., physical space, materials, etc.) and human resources (time to participate, disruption of typical schedules) are considered by the RRC. Research whose benefits do not outweigh the costs of participating will be rejected by the RRC.
- District data requirements: Research applications requiring GCS to provide institutional data on students, families, or staff, must consider legal and privacy requirements such as FERPA (https://www2.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/fpco/ferpa/index.html), PPRA (https://studentprivacy.ed.gov/content/ppra), and IDEA (https://sites.ed.gov/idea/). Requests that do not sufficiently protect student privacy will be rejected by the RRC. Requests that are large in scope and require significant contributions from GCS staff to produce may be rejected due to the human resource costs as identified in (5).
- Quality of materials: The RRC considers whether research application materials are clearly and consistently written, free of errors, and complete. Applications not meeting standards in these areas may be rejected by the RRC.
Final Documentation
Guilford County Schools requires that the final written results (such as academic articles, summary reports, posters, etc.) of any project approved by the research review process be sent to the Research Review Committee (reuttek@gcsnc.com) within 6 months upon completion of research activities. This allows GCS to learn from and potentially use the findings from internal research projects that take place in our district to improve student success and learning. Please note that these written results and the findings within may be shared both internally within GCS as well as publicly (such as on the GCS website).
- The application web form must be completed, including the following: