1. Include what the impact of this problem is on the local setting. Are student succeeding in high school or are they struggling? Is the problem persisting into later school years? You can build this section a bit.
The problem is that 65% of students at Fred M. Lynn Middle School failed to meet the state average (U.S.News.com, 2023). Despite past efforts and present initiatives such as course revisions and mentoring systems, the persistently low level of mathematics remains the same. This is especially concerning, specifically about the importance of math proficiency for academic and career achievement (Ten Braak et al., 2022). Furthermore, according to (Lee &and Lee, 2020), the failure to meet the state averages reflects on students’ academic success and negatively impacts the school’s overall standing and reputation in the community .
2. Discuss the use of a codes and themes table.
Interview Procedures
The researcher used semi-structured interviews to collect data for the study. Semi-structured interviews offer flexible benefits so that the study will gather relevant and rich information (Knott et al., 2022). The semi-structured interview design will allow for the structuring of questions to help solicit information that meets the study’s goals (Roberts, 2020). The selected design provided an avenue for collecting insights from the perspectives and experiences of those directly involved with the problem.
Protocol recommendations included carrying out three main steps: making preparations, designing research questions, and implementing the interview (Knott et al., 2022). Purposeful sampling was used to select participants. With purposeful sampling, the study will elicit participants with characteristics that fit the study’s requirements and goals (Claxton & Michael, 2023). The study targeted five math teachers from Fred M. Lynn Middle School to be participants in the interview. Out of the five participants, two teachers were from the 6th grade, one teacher from the 7th grade, and the remaining two teachers were from the 8th grade. The participants for this study met the inclusion criteria since they are all math teachers at the school and, therefore, were pivotal in depicting the nature of and problems associated with mathematics performance at the school (Langley & Meziani, 2020). Teachers within the school are a source of valuable and reliable information, and their insights are critical to understanding the mathematics performance of students at Fred M. Lynn Middle School.
The study invited the participants to the school library for interviews. The school library had segregated rooms, offering the privacy and conduciveness needed for one-on-one conversations. Each session took up to 45 minutes, permitting the researcher to exhaust all the avenues and interview goals. All the conversations around the interview were audio recorded and transcribed for data analysis. The study further inquired about the participant’s job titles, level of education, and work experience in the role.
Besides selecting participants and the interview setting, the study also applied the standard interview protocol to prepare and implement the interviews. Before the interview, the participants were informed of the interview’s intent, the time each interview would take, and channels for inquiry and feedback. The study also performed pilot tests to gauge the viability of the interview, including identifying potential flaws (Knott et al., 2022). Research questions are designed for the interview process and are tailored to fit the research purpose while eliciting maximum information (Langley & Meziani, 2020). Ensuring that the interview questions are backed up by existing research (Claxton & Michael, 2023) is essential. The interviewer posed basic questions first, then progressed to tough questions while ensuring they focused on the interview prompts.
Data analysis for this study centered on thematic analysis. The first step involved transcribing the interviews, where the interview audio was developed into text. From the transcribed data, the study identified codes, which are categories of various phrases and keywords within the text. Codes provide the building block for the patterns and themes within a study topic (Knott et al., 2022). The researcher read through the text and established segments of themes as found in the text. Different patterns and themes were identified from the codes related to the study topic. The codes will align with the purpose of the research topic (Claxton & Michael, 2023). Data was then analyzed and interpreted based on the themes and patterns. The interpretations were then summarized and presented in writing with utmost transparency .