Abstract:

Graduate Research Assistants (GRAs) are given the opportunity to participate in research with an experienced faculty member. This behind-the-scenes experience mentors GRAs through the whole research process from creating research questions to literature reviews to collecting data and analyzing data. This qualitative research study followed three doctoral GRAs assigned to the same professor over the course of the 2021-2022 academic year. This study answers the following research question: What experiences impacted the understanding of research for GRAs? Focus groups, research journals, and weekly meetings data were collected, organized, coded, and analyzed for themes and patterns though this case study design (Merriam, 1998; Saldaña, 2009). The analysis was accomplished at two levels: within each case and across the cases (Yin, 2009).

The results of this study found these School of Teacher Education GRAs applied to this position to learn from an expert. At the beginning of the academic year, their research knowledge was limited due to their lack of experiences, textbook knowledge, doctoral program knowledge, and teaching knowledge. Through guidance of research within this GRA immersion, the meaningful research experiences included being supported with exemplars, choosing a research design, hands-on experiences, research discussions, reflective process, future resources, time to complete research, and processing time. Research understandings or outcomes achieved included real-world research, a fluid non-linear research process, research sense making, essence of research, pacing of research, understanding a literature review, being comfortable coding as well as discussing coding strategies. The GRA experiences were transferred into their college courses through transcription software, literature review organization, and connection between them. The identified research proficiencies still needed were to experience the complete research cycle including writing the research paper and publishing. It was noted by the GRAs that each person is given a different experience depending on which professor the GRA has the opportunity to work with. Cautions and suggestions are then given by the GRAs. Overall, recommendations are given on how to create effective research experiences for GRAs.

References:
[1] Merriam, S. B. (1998). Qualitative research and case study applications in education. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
[2] Saldaña, J. (2015). The coding manual for qualitative research. Third Edition. Sage Publication Ltd.
[3] Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (4th ed., Vol. 5). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Keywords:

Graduate Assistant Research, Mentorship, Research Experiences.