Qualitative Research Methods

Catalog description

This course will enable students to become informed users and consumers of scholarly qualitative research. The focus of this course is to develop an understanding of the elements and structure of qualitative research, methods and processes that support it, and the development of the skills necessary to analyze, develop, and complete a qualitative dissertation. Students will learn various types of qualitative methodologies, research design such as case study, grounded theory, phenomenology, and ethnography. Students will develop a qualitative purpose statement and research question(s), identify the population and sample, and use tools to analyze qualitative data. In addition, students will learn approaches for establishing reliability and validity, data collection methods including interview protocol development, and the application of ethical and legal standards to the qualitative research process.