Analyzes nine ethnographic educational evaluation studies and shows how the theories chosen resulted from a negotiation of values among three participant groups: evaluators, funders, and practitioners. The studies reveal that the funder-evaluator relationship can become explosive when value differences are pronounced. Therefore, the evaluator…

Describes how an educational anthropologist's study objectives developed during fieldwork conducted in a fundamentalist Christian school and community. Asserts that this narrative reflects the strong relation of problem finding to problem solving in the practice of naturalistic inquiry. (KH)

Provides a critical overview of articles in this issue on field work in administration and policy. Focuses on three recurrent themes: field worker role; reciprocity (the repayment a fieldworker makes to his or her informants); and ethics. (KH)

Discussed in this paper are the problems of evaluation research on a program for disadvantaged youth in Israel. (Author/EB)

Considers some of the differences between "qualitative" and "quantitative" types of research, suggests three kinds of strategies for identifying qualitatively derived models and data that could be useful in collaboration across orientations, and concludes with some remarks on implications of both types of research. (Author/JM)

Reviews and criticizes papers by Rist, Fienberg, and Erickson in this issue of the Quarterly. (JM)

There are two reasons that ethnographic research in education produces good results but has a bad reputation. First is the way that scientific research has been used to justify the faults of educational institutions. Second is the inability of ethnographic research to be useful to educational practitioners. (Author/GC)

Concludes that if we do find ourselves in a situation of multiple paradigmatic perspectives on educational research, then it is not appropriate to think in the near future of there being a 'ground synthesis' of quantitative and qualitative methodologies. If the two major paradigms do exist as outlined here, and neither finds its present framework…

Concludes that in addition to using multivariate methods to analyze their data, investigators need to begin thinking in terms of large-scale randomized controlled field trails (i.e., experiments). One of the challenges for the ethnographic educational researcher is to demonstrate the superiority of the anthropological field method over the more…

Asserts that quantitative analysis facilitates the linguistic study of variability in language. The implications of such study for education are in the areas of individual diagnosis and placement. Quantitative analysis is less comfortable to linguists when it is used to generalize or obscure linguistic differences. The latter seems to be the more…

Comments on the preceding article by Bogdan, and discusses how to help college students in qualitative methods courses to develop analytic and synthetic skills in the presentation and formulation of research problems. (GC)

Reviews some major characteristics of ethnography as they apply to policy issues and policy formulation, and ethnography's utility from the perspective of how public educational policy is made. Discusses the potential contributions of ethnography and the responsibilities ethnographers must consider if their work is to have an impact on public…

Responses to papers in this Quarterly by Roger W. Shuy and Courtney B. Cazden. (JM)

Clarifies a general approach to understanding teaching effectiveness research, outlines the requirements of the kind of research that is believed likely to result in verified generalizations about the primary dimensions along which effective and ineffective teachers vary, and provides an example of the kind of research it is believed is needed.…

Responds to papers in this Quarterly by Colley and Smith. (JM)