Chapter Four: Research design and methodology
4.7 Data collection
Once ethical clearance was received from the University of KwaZulu-Natal Ethics Committee (see Appendix 1), the researcher forwarded a letter to the local Department of Education (see Appendix 2) seeking permission to conduct research at the schools in the Isandlwana / Rorke‟s Drift area. The researcher also forwarded an application to conduct research in these schools to the Department of Education. Additionally, a letter seeking permission to conduct research in the partner schools was forwarded to the principals of the schools (see Appendix 3) and to the CEO of the DRF (see Appendix 4). Once permission was granted by the Department of Education (see Appendix 5), the CEO of the DRF (see Appendix 6) and the relevant school principals, the researcher went to the Isandlwana / Rorke‟s Drift area for a period of three weeks to collect data.
Data for this research study was collected using various methods which included a document analysis, non-participant observation, a checklist, semi-structured interviews, a preference analysis, and Participatory Action Research (PAR). There were three phases to the data collection stage of the research study that the researcher followed.
Phase one of the research study entailed the researcher carrying out a document analysis. A document analysis was conducted to gain a greater understanding of the DRF, its history and goals. According to Rule and John (2011) the documents of a case can be used to gain a sense of the case and can be useful in order to put the case into context. The researcher therefore examined the various reports, newsletters and other documents that were made available.
Phase two of the research study entailed the researcher going to the Rorke‟s Drift / Isandlwana area for a period of two weeks. Within this phase of the research study a series of semi-structured interviews were conducted to gain an in-depth understanding of the interviewees‟ stories regarding the phenomena under study. The use of a semi-structured interview also allowed the interviewer to probe the participants to ensure that they conveyed a rich account of the phenomena under study (Starks & Trinidad, 2007).
A series of semi-structured interviews was conducted with the CEO of the DRF (see Appendix 7) in order to gain an in-depth understanding of the DRF as an organisation together with its goals, aims and reasons for choosing the interventions that have been implemented at its seventeen partner schools. Additionally, a semi-structured interview was conducted with each of the principals (see Appendix 8) of the eight partner schools that were chosen to be included in the sample of this study. In the interview with the principals the researcher aimed to gain an understanding of each school‟s mission, its relationship with the DRF and the principal‟s understanding of school improvement as well as of the school improvement interventions that have been implemented in each school by the DRF and how these have assisted them.
During the interviews with the principals the researcher also conducted a preference analysis (see Appendix 9) with the principals of each of the eight selected schools. The preference analysis consisted of a list of all the interventions that the DRF had conducted with all the schools in the area. The principals were then asked to rank each intervention in terms of their preference and how they viewed each of the interventions in terms of importance to bringing about school improvement in their schools. However, most of the principals did not understand how to complete the preference analysis as they understood the preference analysis to be a checklist to determine what interventions they would like to have implemented within their schools. As a result, they rated all the items as important. The researcher, therefore, could not make use of the results from the preference analysis.
During the visits to the eight partner schools, the researcher also engaged in non-participatory observation, whereby the researcher made observations of the partner schools with the use of a checklist (see Appendix 10) and in the process gained an understanding of what interventions the DRF has implemented in each school (Rule & John, 2011). At the same
time, the researcher was able to gain a brief limited understanding of the functioning and the running of the selected schools.
Lastly, the researcher engaged in Participatory Action Research (PAR) in order to gain a greater understanding of the context in which the schools were based (Rule & John, 2011).
This was done by going on a transect walk with members of the community. These walks allowed the researcher to gain a rich understanding of the living conditions and way of life of the individuals in these communities (Rule & John, 2011). This was beneficial to the researcher as it provided some insight into the contextual factors that influence school improvement.
In the third phase of this research study the researcher returned to the Rorke‟s Drift / Isandlwana area for a period of one week. In this phase of the research, the researcher chose two schools from the original sample of eight schools in order to focus on these schools in more depth. The researcher‟s aim was to gain an account of how the interventions were used and their benefits to the selected schools.
The researcher chose a school that was “good” and a school that was “bad” based on the findings and impressions that the researcher gained of the schools during the second phase of the study. A “good” school, in the eyes of the researcher, was a school that was running well based on the impression that the researcher got from the interview with the principal and from the non-participant observation conducted during phase two of the research. A “bad”
school, in the eyes of the researcher, was a school that seemed to be running well yet the manner in which the principal answered the questions during the interview led the researcher to believe that there was some form of malingering that occurred, and it did not seem as though the principal was confident with running of the school as there were some aspects that the principal was not aware of.
Within this phase, whilst the researcher was at the chosen schools, observations were also carried out. The researcher examined the running of the schools, sat in on lessons with different teachers to observe classroom dynamics and spoke to teachers and learners (see Appendix 11), with an aim of gaining a greater understanding of the DRF and the interventions that it has implemented, as well as of the functioning of the schools.