> My problem is that the "real-life" execution of the research often
> did not go as planned because of: 1) administrative & political
> problems associated with the college where the research was taking
> place and 2) getting student volunteers to do what I wanted them
> to do (volunteers in an online course have a tendency to
> "disappear" into cyberspace). I'm struggling trying to figure out
> what to do with data that isn't as complete as I would have liked.
Mike Salvo and Steve posted a lot of what I would say about
dissertations in general. Another thought: one of the reasons I asked
Greg Ulmer to chair my doctoral committee is his view of the
dissertation as a "practice book" -- which means that the lessons
learned from the dissertation exercise are more important than the
product itself. So one gets to try more outlandish (outlimbish?)
things, as long as they can be contextualized.
"Practice book" is not a lowering of standards of intellectual rigor,
etc, but an emphasis on developing the methodology of research, the
questions that have to be asked, the focus, etc. I suppose it has
elements of an apprenticeship model.
I'd suggest that if possible, your dissertation reflect the problem
with online courses. "Incomplete" results and all. Use the
incompleteness to leverage a grant to complete the work... :)
cbd.
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Bradley Dilger http://web.nwe.ufl.edu/~dilger/
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