From: john7552@MACH1.WLU.CA ((Niall Johnson u))
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.qualrs-l
Subject: Re: PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH
Date: 5 Oct 92 21:38:09 GMT
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              at Oct 5, 92 5:54 pm


 I must say I was delighted to see Robin McTaggart respond to the many
question people had raised about the Deakin project.
The answers Robin provided I found to be most re-assuring. I can only say
why was the information missing from the original post.
The original post should have either been much briefer and inviting requests
for detailed information OR should have been far more detailed (running the
risk of annoying people that way!)


Robin McTaggart wrote:
>
> I am stunned at the passion my recent communication about the existence of an
> action reseach course available from Australia generated.  For a community
> interested in qualitative research methods, the remarakable extrapolations and
> attributions made by some commentators were alarming given a few short words
> outlining a proposal to offer a course.  I shall leave aside the more
> unfortunate observations made and provide some further information which may
> serve to put the anxious hearts of the moral police at rest.

Too few words, or not enough!

> 1.	The fee of $US2000 for a 0.25 fractional enrolment does not generate
> profit.  It is simply the fee level for full cost recovery generally required
> of Australian institutions by the Australian government.  The cost of
> PROVIDING a year of full time study in Australia is about $US8000.  This is
> comparable with the costs of provision in the least expensive US institutions,
> and is very much less expensive than major US private institutions.  Costs to
> students in non-private institutions vary because the state in various ways
> subsidises tuition so that students do not have to pay the full cost of their
> education.

Fair comment.

[para. deleted]

> 2.	We KNOW that the fee structure precludes study by many students and
> institutions with whom we would be delighted to work.  However, that does not
> seem to us to be sufficient reason not to draw the attention of the
> possibility to students who can afford it, or who might have access to support
> funds to enable their participation.  For example, the combination of usual US
> student fees and the 'hidden' state contribution would go close to paying the
> fee we are committed to provided the state contribution could be prised out of
> the students' home institution. The grounds would be that the home institution
> would be 'buying in' tutition rather providing it.  This is a very complex
> issue which begins to look like an inter-institutional arrangement when
> dicussed in these terms, but it is a possibility.

Difficult to sell to some/many departments/schools.

> 3.	The theory and practice of 'distance education' (and 'open learning') is
> alive and well.  Students complete undergraduate, masters and doctoral degrees
> 'at a distance' in the worlds' most reputable universities.  The so-called
> 'disembodied  professors' are also alive and well and in regular contact with
> their students who, in general terms, have infinitely better access to the
> material support for learning than most on-campus students have.  However,
> distance education students everywhere welcome contact by whatever means
> available with other students enrolled in the same or similar courses.  Hence,
> we explore the possibilities created by email as a more reflexive
> communication mode than print.  (In print we encourage students to write for
> each other in a 'course journal', communicating with each other between the
> far corners of Australia and occasionally overseas).

Distance education is becoming a bigger issue in Australia and Deakin is
riding the wave in a big way.
iWhilst many universities have had distance education programs the federal
govt. is pushing them into using tv and Deakin has been involved (and now
appear to be moving in other directions also).
The open university (tv) issue is also beginning to be somewhat of a battle
between universities - a battle for status and funding that is getting
seriously ugly!

> 4.	The 'disembodied professors' are much less so than the authors of most
> texts which are grist to the mill for both graduate and undergraduate students
> everywhere.  The concern about an inability to learn from people you cannot
> see is a curious one for email users.

Fair comment.

> 5.	The concern that the course is not for credit is an aberration of
> understanding.
>
> 6.	The curious claim that there is something wrong with the 'pedagogical
> integrity' of the course cannot be addressed since it is not clear what the
> objection is.  However, it is possible to say that (i) the course has been
> completed by several hundred students, (ii) the course materials have sold in
> thousands throughout the world, and (iii) its 'administration' has never been
> a problem.  As for 'hucksterism' (or being akin to it), no-one has ever
> accused of that before, but then, most people read our materials and otherwise
> get to know us a little before they leap into judgment mode.

But was this clear in the original posting? No.
The original posting was flawed (to say the least).

> 7.	One of the reasons that students, professionals and community workers
> attached to institutions throughout the world can now use action research
> methodology is BECAUSE of the materials published about its methodology Q in
> part by faculty members of Deakin University.  This clearly is a worldwide
> movement, but to submit a PhD using action research methodology and NOT to
> have referred to Deakin work on action research would be to take a risk of
> some note.

Was this in the original posting?

> 8.	One of the reasons we felt moved to offer the course more broadly than we
> do is because we are concerned that graduate students trying to use action
> research methodology are often not getting the advice they need in
> institutions where faculty have little experience of the method and
> methodology.  This not a fanciful and self-regarding whim on our part, it is
> concrete experience when invited to advise on and examine theses.  The debate
> about action research earlier this year moved me to offer some references to
> QUAL-R participants individually which were than later circulated to the list.
> The offer of the course extends that support.
>
> 9.	No network rules (or other ethics or principles) have been violated.
>
> Having said all that I again draw the attention of potential students and
> interested professors to the courses and the resources which underpin it.  We
> cannot easily fix the cost-structures which contain our work, and even if we
> wanted to we cannot work without salaries and infrastructure costs.  The
> course is a good one, and if there is a way we can help people to find the
> wherewithal to do it, please let us know.  If you simply want to buy the
> course materials as several QUAL-R participants already have indicated, they
> too can be provided on invoice.

Robin, thank you for providing these answers. I doubt the remarks many of us
had posted were personal or malicious. I just believe that people were
expressing their doubts about what little information had been posted.


--
Ciao

Niall Johnson,
Dept. of Geography,
Wilfrid Laurier University.
     john7552@mach1.wlu.ca
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