Introduction
Each individual, or collaborative, project forms only a single part of progressive change. As committed researchers, we need to leave behind a permanent record of our work as a marker for those who follow us. They can thus refer to it and, more importantly, build creatively upon it. A comprehensive wiki, process reflection, and executive summary offers multiple researchers and whole communities easy access to your research and recommendations, while scrutiny of your working papers and reflections helps others to avoid your mistakes or dead ends, and build more robustly on your successes. Your final wiki should integrate as rich a mix of media as you need to convey the full scope of your research.
Final RING Products
There are three components that will be evaluated as part of your RING Dissemination of Results final assignment. These include:
1. Final Version of RING Wiki
The most valuable workspaces are those that begin as a research project commences. Your group should try to keep electronic copies of all your brainstorming, all your library searches (including the search terms you use), and all your composing, at every stage of your project. Each whole-group and sub-group meeting should work out, too, how to keep a permanent record of its meetings. You might appoint a minute-taker, or you might decide to record in audio or via video, your whole-group and sub-group meetings.
Your final Wiki should include evidence of your RING’s process and project throughout the semester. Material should be labeled and easy to navigate for outsiders unfamiliar with the project. Each previous sub-element of the RING assignment should be included (Communication Plan; Needs Assessment; Literature Review; Research Plan; Data Analysis; and Final Presentation material) and updated to reflect your group’s actual process. In addition, the final version of your Wiki should include the following:
- a screen that weaves together the findings of all the studies in the project and offers recommendations to your community partner based on the data.
- copies of all research instruments you created (such as surveys, sets of interview questions, etc.) with a short reflection on the success of each
- a representative selection of your most important research resources (copies of/links to articles, book chapters, etc.)
- a new Wiki page called “Course Connections” that highlights how your RING has applied the ideas, themes, and texts covered in 203 that influenced your thinking on this project.
- a copy of any powerpoint slides, scripts, or exercises used in your final presentation.
- a complete bibliography in APA format (in which all URLs function).
2. RING Process Reflection
In addition to the above, you should create a new Wiki page that includes a 750-1000 word reflection on how your group functioned throughout the RING experience. This includes any insights from how you implemented your Communication Plan, as well as:
- a postscript, in which you recommend how future students might continue the action research cycles you have begun
- an identification of the most productive strategies a successor group might wish to follow, based on your experience, and the pitfalls you would advise that successor group to try to avoid
- a final reflection on your relationships, as a group, and as individuals, to the community(ies) within which you worked this semester, and on how those experiences might influence your community involvement in the future
3. An Orientating Front Page Screen
Finally, you should create a new wiki screen that offers an Executive Summary (750 – 1000 words) of your research as a whole, including your recommendations to your community partner. This should be a succinct summary of the highlights of your research process, findings, and recommendations for future research and applications that will be shared with community partners. It should also provide the links to the subsequent screens to help the user easily navigate the information you have provided in the wiki.
Due: 5/13, 11pm. 50 points.
Please electronically notify your instructor when the final wiki is ready for viewing.