The following notes were contributed by Jessica Perron, a first year M.Ed student who has been spearheading on-site EGS meetings to further develop and enhance graduate culture at Nipissing.
The second Education Graduate Students meeting took place Thursday February 12th and was attended by five part- and full-time students. Catherine Giroux (a previous contributor to our blog) started the meeting by facilitating a wonderful article discussion regarding the importance of collaboration among educators and other disciplines such as healthcare and justice studies. Students explored several main points including: inter-professional collaboration, importance of healthcare knowledge in education, and holistic education. Students further considered the benefits of bringing a qualitative approach to the education and healthcare research fields to add a personal perspective to these issues. Questions that were raised included:
-How do I know which research method is best suited for my research project?
-What are the benefits of qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods research?
-How do sample size and the chosen audience affects method choice?
– What benefits are gained when using qualitative methodology and include participant “voice”.
Our next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, February 26th from 6-7pm. We will again offer Skype as an option; however, since it has yet to be utilized, we will only offer future sessions through Skype by special request. We hope to see you there!
