Mary Katherine O'Connor

Grounded Theory Managing the Challenge for Those Facing Institutional Review Board Oversight

The authors examine one of the earliest systematic forms of qualitative inquiry to identify some of the boundaries needed in grounded theory designs to provide a small corner of clarity in the discourse about what is acceptable science from the Institutional Review Board (IRB) perspective. Beginning with an overview of grounded theory research as it was originally conceived and extended, the challenges for establishment of a uniform standard are put forth. Within this background and context, the authors report the results of a content analysis of a sampling of dissertation abstracts claiming to use grounded theory. Results reveal the need to clarify standards for different types of grounded theory research to help those facing IRB oversight. The authors assert that there are two useful sets of standards that should be applied to the assessment of the quality of a grounded theory design and researchers should not confuse the two.

Team-based Research Notes from the Field

This article reviews the literature on research using teams, including interdisciplinary teams, teams that span universities and are geographically distant, and teams using qualitative and mixed methods. It reports experiences of two multi-year, externally funded, multiple-university research teams that used both qualitative and quantitative methods. It concludes with suggestions for others undertaking teambased research.

Teaching Policy Analysis as Research: Consideration and Extension of Options.

Teaching policy analysis is compared to teaching research skills. Both involve the selection of an appropriate analytical tool to be used with multiple units of analysis; and in both, the selected instrument must fit the purpose of the analysis or the product is not useful. Policy analysis frameworks characteristically address policy process, content, and performance. However, these frameworks are based on different worldviews, with embedded assumptions and with deep philosophical roots that may be rational (classical), interpretive, or progressive (radical). These different assumptions can lead to very different analytical expectations and results. Here, we justify teaching policy analysis as research, categorize a number of frameworks, and provide recommendations for equipping students to critically assess issues that arise in the development and use of policy analysis frameworks.

Recognizing the need for evidence-based macro practices in organizational and community settings.

ABSTRACT The need for using evidence-based macro practices is examined. EBP is viewed as practitioners recognizing client values and then using the most promising research to guide programmatic, organizational, community, and policy activities to facilitate change. There are multiple ways to search for evidence. The nature of evidence in macro practice will look different depending on the practice situation. Being able to assess the situation and recognize the context in which one is practicing will set the stage for how EBP should be defined. A set of questions are suggested to guide decision-making regarding the use and the management of evidence.

Teaching Students About Collaborative Approaches to Organizational Change

This article explores the implications of teaching students about collaborative practice in organizations and how collaboration in making changes requires finding and developing alternative models to traditional approaches. It discusses the limits of models of planned change that are taught in organizational practice, identifies the underlying assumptions of collaborative approaches to change, and proposes a beginning framework for teaching students how to use collaborative change in organizations.

An Analysis of Stakeholder Views on Children's Mental Health Services

The purpose was to examine the perspectives of mental health stakeholders as a means to guide the adaptation of evidence-based treatments. The Mental Health System Ecological (MHSE) model was used to organize therapist, administrator, and parent perspectives gathered using qualitative methods. The MHSE model posits the influences of client-level, provider-level, intervention-specific, service delivery, organizational, and service system characteristics on implementation. Focus groups and interviews were conducted with community mental health stakeholders and included parents, therapists, and administrators (N = 21). Participants included 11 primarily Caucasian (90.48%) female participants, ranging in ages between 31 and 57 years. Data were analyzed according to the MHSE model. Frequency counts were tabulated for each theme and stakeholder group differences were determined using the Mann-Whitney test. Stakeholder groups mentioned needs at each level of the MHSE model. Stakeholder group differences most notably emerged with child and family themes, which included complexity of mental health issues, parenting differences, and family stressors. Stakeholders identified challenges for optimal mental health services for children across multiple levels of an ecological model. Implications of the findings are discussed, including the continued relevance of adapting mental health interventions by increasing their flexible application across multiple target problems and the promise of partnership approaches.

A Multidimensional Agency Survey

Human service agency cultures are often difficult to understand. Competing values and paradoxical assumptions add to that difficulty. In this study, we use a well-established framework for organizational analysis to establish a tool to assess differing values and assumptions in diverse field agencies. A total of 200 MSW field instructors responded to a mailed survey at a 50% response rate. Comparisons of responses by participants in private and public agencies revealed that public agencies tended to have more traditional cultures than nonprofit agencies. Younger agencies were more likely to score higher than older agencies on items representing alternative perspectives. Participants perceived their organizations as straddling multiple perspectives. Knowing what values and assumptions are dominant within an organization may allow the professional to assess his or her fit within that organization and how to approach change within respective cultures.

Finding Homes for Their Dreams: Strategies Founders and Program Initiators Use to Position and Sustain Faith-Based Programs

This grounded theory study of 15 faith-based programs in four urban cities examines how initiators and founders find homes for their visions of addressing unmet community needs, especially those of children and their families. Founders can be congregations, individuals, or groups with diverse characteristics. This study suggests that they place their visions in viable contexts through developing new organizations in which to place their programs, temporarily incubating them until a new organization can be formed, tethering them to congregations, or birthing them in well-established faith-related agencies with deep historical roots in the community. These programs have the potential to become legends, influencing the identity of their organizational homes and the larger communitys images of those homes.

Reclaiming and Reimagining Macro Social Work Education: A Collective Biography

ABSTRACT The authors focus on a collective biography of 12 women social work educators, all either tenured or in tenure lines, from five different universities at the time of the study. The participants represent several aspects of macro practice including administration, planning, community practice, and policy. Beginning with reflections about coming into macro practice, we highlight memories about first teaching experiences and examine cultural shifts discovered in our academic journeys. We feature students who inspired us and perceptions of challenges in curricular development affecting the preparation of students. This article includes comments that emphasize the themes and focus of our collective reflections. Finally, we place what we learned in the context of a report from the Association for Community Organization and Social Administration calling for the visibility of and advocacy for macro social work education.

Emergent Program Planning as Competent Practice

Abstract Built on the assumption that both rational and nonrational thought go into problem solving, but only rational approaches have been presented as appropriate technology for program development, this article offers an alterative way of designing social programs. We call this approach “emergent planning.” Our aim is to provide a conceptualization of planning processes that will be useful regardless of culture, mission or goals of the human service organization within which planning and service occur. Our hope is to deconstruct what constitutes rational thinking in program planning in order to critically consider alternative ways of thinking and planning within the context of multiculturalism and globalization. The goal is recognition of a subjugated model of planning so that those who do not plan rationally are not automatically assumed to lack competence to engage in “real” planning and effective problem solving.