SUBJECT PARTICIPATION IN EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH

This dissertation was written to serve three purposes: to explore the philosophical roots of the dominant mode of conducting educational research, to summarize dissatisfaction within the educational community concerning the purposes, methods and uses of this research, and to attempt to point the way toward a philosophically reoriented research that would respond to the identified dissatisfaction.;Next, philosophers of education writing in the 1972 Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education (NSSE) were reviewed. I concluded that these philosophers wished to redirect research and education away from its role as a mechanism for channeling students into prescribed social roles. I further concluded that their recommendations for redirecting research fell short of their own prescribed goals.;I then posited a research model that would achieve the purposes identified by the NSSE authors. This category of research was termed "Subject Participation." This research would require that persons from the community being studied be actively involved in justifying the study, designing the study, and carrying out the study.;Finally, an attempt was made to lay a philosophical foundation for the research desired and to point the way toward strategies that could better achieve the purposes of education called for by the NSSE authors and by Spring and Raskin. This attempt relied heavily on social phenomenology and was augmented by works from the areas of cultural materialism and critical theory.;The philosophical roots of educational research were synthesized from educational research texts and publications sponsored by Phi Delta Kappa and the American Educational Research Association. These roots were established to be primarily positivistic and behavioristic. More importantly, I concluded that these authors were highly supportive of the use of education to prepare students to meet the social and vocational needs of the existing social structure. Works by educational critics Spring and Raskin were reviewed and a strong correlation between the purposes stated by the educational researchers and the charges of these radical critics of American education, was shown to exist.