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PurposeThis study explores how district leaders shape the absorptive capacity of research–practice partnerships (RPPs) when addressing local problems of practice. Design/methodology/approachDrawing from Farrellet al.(2019), we focus on three core partnership domains shaping absorptive capacity: (a) prior knowledge, (b) communication pathways and (c) strategic knowledge leadership. We then employ a mixed-methods, multiple-case study design (Yin, 2013), highlighting two districts participating in a five-year National Science Foundation grant (2019–2024) to improve math instruction and learning. Data collected include semi-structured interviews (N = 180), the Visions of High-Quality Mathematics Instruction Rubric (VHQMI), social network surveys, meeting observations (N = 80) and the effective teams rubric (ETR). FindingsData suggest that district leaders variably shape an RPP’s absorptive capacity to engage in joint-partnership work. Notably, these differences are related to the degree to which district leaders promote or hinder the assimilation of new knowledge among other stakeholders within the RPP network. Originality/valueIndeed, we do not yet know how district leaders moderate stakeholder involvement within a given RPP network and how such involvement might influence the partnership’s absorptive capacity to address local problems of practice.
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The Design and Implementation of a Method for Evaluating and Building Research Practice Partnerships
We have established a research-practice partnership (RPP) to build a computer science (CS) and computational thinking (CT)-focused STEM ecosystem at two middle schools. Creating such an ecosystem to broaden student participation in computing through an RPP approach involves all stakeholders in the research process. Borrowing upon visual participatory research methods, we developed a graphic research instrument to engage teachers in the research process and elicit their perspectives on strategies for building the ecosystem. This experience report describes our research methodology across two distinct cases to demonstrate the utility of this drawing activity as an investigative and partnership development tool. The contribution is in offering a flexible approach to other university-based RPP teams that enables a synergistic partnership development tool and data collection instrument that can be tailored to a variety of RPP contexts, facilitating more productive and equitable ways of engaging stakeholders in the research process. We describe our project contexts and share results from the pilot study with practitioner-members of our RPP teams. We discuss two cases to highlight the contribution this approach made to the development of our partnerships.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1837240
- PAR ID:
- 10302567
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Proceedings of the 52nd ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Conference Paper:
- https://doi.org/10.1145/1234567890
