On-Campus Ph.D. Program

Qualitative Methods Specialization

The specialization in qualitative methods is designed to prepare exceptional and highly qualified researchers and teachers for academic positions and other educational settings, methodology consultants for state and private organizations, and evaluators for various grant organizations.

Individuals with qualitative research specialty area are in high demand, for example, in education, nursing, psychology, information management, and human studies to name a few. Nationally only a handful of programs train students in a qualitative methodology program.

The On-Campus Ph.D. program with a qualitative methods specialization consists of:

Core courses
Two graduate College of Education graduate-level courses
Desired Electives
Minor (optional)
Qualifying Exams
Dissertation

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Core Courses

The doctoral candidate in Research and Evaluation Methodology is expected to complete a minimum of 90 hours of classes, including a minimum of 20 hours of EDF7980 – Doctoral Research.

Each student must complete the following requirements:

EDF 6403 – Quantitative Foundations of Educational Research
or
EDF 6400 – Quantitative Foundations of Educational Research: Overview

AND

EDF 6402 – Quantitative Found in Educational Research: Inferential Statistics
or
EDF 6400 – Quantitative Found of Educational Research: Overview

AND

EDF 6481 – Quantitative Research Methods in Education

AND

EDF 6436 – Theory of Measurement
EDF 6471 – Survey Design and Analysis in Educational Research
EDF 6475 – Qualitative Foundations of Educational Research
EDF 6938 – Writing and representation in qualitative research
EDF 7405 – Advanced Quantitative Foundations of Educational Research
EDF 7483 – Qualitative Data Collection
EDF 7479 – Qualitative Data Analysis
EDF 7941 – Evaluation of Educational Products and Systems

Graduate School Rules for Credits that Will Count Toward Final Degree:

EDF 6905 – Maximum of 12 credits throughout degree (only 1 to 3 credits can count per semester)
EDF 6910 – Maximum of 5 credits throughout degree (only 1 to 5 credits can count per semester)
EDF 6940 – Maximum of 5 credits throughout degree (only 1 to 5 can count per semester)
EDF 6941 – Maximum of 9 credits throughout the degree (only 2 to 9 can count per semester)

Graduate-Level Courses

Each student must complete six hours in two of the following courses:

EDF 6905 – Independent Study
EDF 6910 – Supervised Research
EDF 6941 – Practicum in Educational Research

Electives

Elective courses may be taken in Research and Evaluation Methodology, other departments in the College of Education and/or areas outside the College of Education. In addition, all students are encouraged to develop a working knowledge of at least one computer language through formal course work or independent study. Some courses students may want to consider as electives are:

EDG7224 – Critical pedagogy
EDG7982 – Practitioner research: Theory and practice

SYD6806 – Gender and society

GIS5008C – Maps and graphs
GIS5009C – Advanced cartography

HIS6061 – Introduction to historiography
HIS6445 – Postcolonial theories

LIN6601 – Sociolinguistics
LIN7885 – Discourse analysis and pragmatics

PHI5365 – Epistemology

POS6157 – Community analysis

PUP6015 – Comparative policy analysis
PUP6315 – Race, gender, and politics

SYO6535 – Social inequality

WST6348 – Ecofeminism
WST6508 – Advanced feminist theory
WST6936 – Feminist challenges to disciplinary paradigm

Minor

With committee approval, the REM doctoral student may complete a minor outside of the Program in Research and Evaluation Methodology. Requirements for minors vary according to the program offering the minor. Suggested areas include Statistics, Psychology, Sociology, Mathematics, Computer Science, and Business Administration.

Qualifying Exams

All REM Ph.D. students must pass comprehensive qualifying exams. The student is allowed to take the qualifying exams after all required classes have been completed. At the request of the student, the advisor is responsible for scheduling and coordinating the qualifying exams. The comprehensive qualifying exams has written and oral parts. The written exam lasts 12 hours over two days (6 hours each day in two blocks of 3 hours).

The student is expected to answer questions about all the domain areas of the Research and Evaluation Methodology program. After the student has completed the written exams, the doctoral committee will review the student’s responses. If the committee judges the responses satisfactory, they will authorize the student to schedule an oral exam. The oral exam is expected to last two hours. Passing the qualifying exams is required for the student to advance to candidacy, at which point the student can register for dissertation hours and star work on the dissertation proposal.

Dissertation

The dissertation is the final product required from a student to obtain a Ph.D. degree. It consists of a document describing an original research project executed by the student. The main role of a student’s adviser is to guide him/her through the process of producing the dissertation. The dissertation process includes the defense of the dissertation proposal and the dissertation defense.

Dissertation Information

On-Campus Ph.D. Program

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