In spite of a diminishing amount of money available for educational research, a demand still exists for research and evaluation. This paper discusses how to initiate cooperative research between local education agencies and neighboring universities and educational labs and centers. First, the paper identifies problems in the development of cooperative research. Next, it describes the consortium approach to research and details purposes of a metropolitan research partnership. Organizational processes of such a cooperative and predetermined criteria for research are also discussed. The paper concludes that the development of a metropolitan research partnership might be a logical first step to the planning and implementing of large-scale research and evaluation. (Author/LD)