COURSE OUTCOMES & ASSESSMENTS
Built-in Assessments:
HCOM MLO 2 (Research Skills)
Course Outcomes
Through this course you will be able to demonstrate your ability to:
1. Design and conduct oral history research that supports and advances community defined goals, that integrates discipline-based and community funds of knowledge, and that contributes to increased community capacities.
(Relevant activities: project planning, background readings, conducting interviews with first generation college students, integrating the historical, cultural, and demographic particularities of our tri-county region; producing an analysis that benefits first generation college students at CSUMB and in the surrounding region, and disseminating research to high school students in our region).2. Design and carry out a collaborative research plan, with stated research hypothesis, questions, and critique of existing literature; resulting in a coherent, innovative, and well-argued study that serves the community.
(Relevant activities: working in teams to develop overall goals, research questions, hypotheses, assumptions, arguments; critiquing secondary literature and comparing discipline-based analyses with community funds of knowledge; analyzing interviews collaboratively, in mutually responsible and supportive ways; and producing a collaborative final study to be shared with local communities of current or prospective first generation college students).3. Design, conduct, record, and archive original life history interviews, applying intercultural communication skills, cultural and historical knowledge, participant observation, and ethical reflection and practice in a community setting.
(Relevant activities: learning and applying oral history research methods, developing original research instruments such as appropriate questions, informed interview guides, ethical legal releases; conductingculturally and historically informed and sensitive oral history interviews of broadcast sound quality; keeping reflection journals; producing professional transcripts, logs, and subject indexes;archiving tapes in ways that make them publicly accessible but also protected).4. Critically analyze and interpret the oral history narratives and field experiences(primary sources); evaluate them in relation to the critical literature (secondary sources); evaluate, compare, and/or integrate discipline-based and community-based interpretations of first generation accounts.
(Relevant activities: carefully evaluating primary data in relation to assigned readings, in historical and cultural context, taking into account the particular nature of memory and life story narration, and community interpretations of lived experiences; closely annotating and interpreting interviews accordingly).5. Engage in reciprocal exchange and co-creation of knowledge with community.
(Relevant activities: conducting focus-group discussions with first generation campus-based and high school students; sharing and integrating one's own personal experiences of being a first generation student or a student from the region; giving public presentations on campus and in high school settings; and disseminating research on the Web).6. Synthesize overall findings to answer the initial research question; articulate policy recommendations, and reflect on the impact of social action research on the university and its surrounding communities, and return historically and culturally meaningful research to the community.
(Relevant activities: produce a compelling study that connects oral interviews, secondary research, community knowledge, and self reflection; make public its concrete policy implications; present the research in multiple public settings; publish the research on the Web).
