The partnership with East is an exciting opportunity to take what we know about education to a school that needs it. It is crucial that we document this partnership with rigorous research, but that we do not position East as a research lab. To construct a welcoming space for researchers that honors the East community, we have developed the following principles that all proposals will need to address before receiving the school district's letter of approval:
- Research must benefit the mission of the school.
- Relevance to practice must be an explicit criteria.
- The research must be useful to the East community.
- Proposal must be explicit about how this community will benefit (not just researcher benefit).
- Proposals must show how the research will advance the needs of the school without overburdening East and without being intrusive.
- Dissemination of results needs to include the East community (teachers, admins, students, family members).
We have established an East Research Committee, which will serve as the department review for IRB. The committee shall consist of Warner School of Education faculty, East teachers, students and administrators, and family/community members. The committee will ensure that the above criteria are met and will monitor the numbers of studies that are conducted so as not to overburden the East community or disrupt the partnership’s mission.
Process for approval:
- All proposals must first be submitted to the East Research Committee.
- Non-university principal investigators must provide their institution’s IRB approval with their proposal.
- Upon approval from committee, the principal investigator will receive the required letter of support.
- Principal investigators will then follow the usual University of Rochester IRB approval process.