Links to Capstone Proposal

Capstone Proposal Slides

Capstone Components

Annotated Bibliography

Looking forward to Thai Star with the class tonight!

Capstone project possibilities

I’m curious about how local youth can make a significant impact in the movement to prevent hate-fueled violence in Rhode Island. I envision surveying teens from various sources (AS220, YIA, PPSD, PSU, RI Teen Institute, NUA, ARISE, Youth Driven, URI Media Lab, scouts, athletes, and/or other nonprofits, etc.) to find how much/why they care about preventing hate-fueled violence, what policies and practices they think would help, and generally what would make them feel safe – in society, at school, in their homes. I can envision recruiting youth into a group that seeks to implement some of these practices. Because I did this as a teen, I can envision a youth-led theatre troupe that writes and acts out skits about real-life scenarios teens may find themselves in, where the main character has a choice to make that could likely lead to a positive outcome, or a more risky or negative one. Maybe we tour schools or regularly stage performances.

I’m still curious about the content of foundational YDEV MA classes that I have yet to take. I’d like to have a stronger handle on the five anchors. Or maybe I do and I don’t know it?

I want my influence in the world to be as a peace-spreader, and my natural abilities have always directed me to seek out, encourage, and support the brightest and most talented among us to be the kind of leaders who include everyone.

Thoughts on Suspending Damage: A Letter to Communities by Eve Tuck

“A desire-based framework is an antidote to damage-centered research….Desire interrupts the binary of reproduction versus resistance.” - Eve Tuck

Decades ago, I read James Redfield’s The Celestine Prophecy in which four control dramas are described that people somewhat subconsciously slip into to control others, essentially: intimidation, interrogation, aloofness, and victimhood. It helped to frame how I view conflict and power, and I thought about victimhood as Tuck repudiated damage-centered research frameworks.

I appreciated that Tuck's letter offered a new perspective on some issues I’ve been trying to square in my mind, especially concerning race in the aftermath of George Floyd's murder, and trans issues as anti-trans legislation is being introduced across the country.

Following George Floyd’s murder, I contemplated race and privilege in new ways, read some interesting books, engaged in courageous conversations, considered how race affects my relationships and how the social climate was impacting my Black friends and colleagues. It seemed that an image of victimhood was being projected on an entire race, though I understand it's not that simple. Division spread between resistors crying “Defund the Police” and the reproducers who did not. I imagine desire-based research might result in findings showing all people want to feel safe, and/or to be able to trust police to truly protect and serve. "Black Lives Matter" has been more broadly embraced (beyond a slogan as a movement), and seems closer to a desired view of community, without simply reproducing or resisting the racial status quo.

LGBTQ+ advocates often repeat that 40% of trans youth have attempted suicide and disproportionately experience homelessness. While these shocking stats invoke a need to support and protect this demographic, a downside to universally portraying the trans community as “damaged” is that it makes it harder for parents to accept their child’s identity (sometimes leading to homelessness followed by suicidality). I wonder what desire-based research has been done on trans issues. In the many years I worked professionally within my queer community, I often witnessed conflict in which a person's claim to greater victimhood “won” conversations. I desired for my community to have a truer sense of empowerment, camaraderie, and a longer fuse.

As far as how this made me think of myself, it brought up how I have felt in so many doctor's appointments, feeling unheard and wishing doctor's were more curious about how my afflictions inhibited what I wanted for in my life.

Random: I was surprised and delighted to find Tuck in kinship with author Joan Didion, poet Sekou Sundiata, and writer bell hooks.

Last, I’ll miss being with everyone in class this week, as I’m at a conference in Pittsburgh called Eradicate Hate, wondering what would be so terrible about calling it Spread Love. Maybe it’s the same reason Tuck calls her piece Suspending Damage instead of Framing Desire.

Eve Tuck

Reaction to Restler's "What Do You Do That Can't Be Measured?," chapter 1

As I read Victoria Restler’s beautifully tangled first chapter of “What Do You Do That Can’t Be Measured?” within the context of what we’ve focused on so far in class (and in comparison to my own presumptions about education, writing, and research), two things that stood out to me were: 1) how Restler’s inclusion of herself in the writing – her personal identity, family challenges, and experience as an artist, educator, and colleague – would provide context and authority regarding her thesis, and 2) how I expected that the remaining chapters of Restler’s book would combat the relevance of traditional quantitative approaches to understanding positive educational outcomes. I was interested in how Restler explained her “jumble” framework for the research, and wondered: Is radical care particularly difficult to measure, and why?

I kept thinking about all of the RIDE Report Card and SurveyWorks (examples below) information about schools that I have been poring over for two-and-a-half years, trying to find the best path, and therefore school, for my two young children to have a positive experience in the Providence Public School District. I get lost in the percentages, race data, extracurricular opportunities, etc. I get confused about, for example, whether a percentage favorable measure of “school climate” is more important coming from the teachers’ perspectives or the students’, and wonder if respondents are comparing the climate to an expectation or to a previous school or school year. The confusion with the quantitative data has led me to continually seek out individual teacher, administrator, parent, and student perspectives on various schools, curricula, and systems.

As far as how this text made me think of myself and others, I super admire artists and how their minds and processes work, as I’m constantly around them, supporting them, and working with them, but don’t count myself among them. I also admired Restler’s courage in challenging the dominant cis white male perspective in college. 

As Restler examined the public humiliation of teachers ranked as below average or worse, even potentially leading a person to suicide, I thought about how crushing such a ranking would feel to me, and how despondent I once became after getting targeted online.

Regarding what I do that can’t be measured: I concern myself with money, how to spend time, and which people to give energy to, culminating in decisions that affect bank statements, the clock, and personal health that I often wished could be measured in such a way that led me to either have confidence in my decisions or change behaviors. But I’m not willing to crunch numbers, set a timer, or eliminate relationships definitively, so it all comes down to in-the-moment decisions and a sense that outcomes are good enough.

In terms of immeasurable radical care, I can be overly thoughtful in professional approaches to writing-style, or how my actions can impact group dynamics among colleagues, that I tend to spend far more time than is expected of me to prepare for and complete responsibilities.

Coding example of 45's rally speeches from New York Times

Whoa. Same day Lesley and Rachael teach us how to code, NYTimes publishes a coded 45 rally speech:

Maxwell's Designing a Qualitative Study

In chapter 7 of Designing a Qualitative Study, Joseph A. Maxwell outlines the four components of qualitative methods of research, which I’ll summarize as: the relationship established with subjects, the when/where/who of sampling decisions, how data is gathered, and how data is analyzed. Regarding data analysis, this passage on page 236 stood out to me:

“Strategies for qualitative analysis fall into three main groups: categorizing strategies (such as coding and thematic analysis), connecting strategies (such as narrative analysis and individual case studies), and memos and displays.”

It stood out because I am very action-oriented. I like to understand what needs to be done and break things down into chronological steps. I understand why the “big picture” is important, but when I identify action steps, I can envision myself accomplishing something definitive, and it motivates me. However, the metaphor referenced in this reading about needing all the parts of a wheelbarrow to be in place before tightening was not lost on me.

I might have previously defined qualitative research as “a pile of anecdotal evidence.” I’d now say an anecdote is data within a qualitative study. I’ve seen firsthand how personal stories can have a more immediate impact on legislation than stats, while still believing that numerical facts were still necessary for people like scientists, doctors, and policymakers to feel confident in their decisions. It was a wake up call to learn years ago that statistics don’t often lead to behavior change – like substance use, spending habits, or preference for a political party – as I find them to impact my own choices. And while I now embrace constructivism and critical theory, I still have ingrained expectations that data will be quantifiably interpreted. In that sense, learning that “validity threats” should be especially anticipated in qualitative research made a lot of sense to me.

This reading had me thinking that our YDev program is all in on constructivist or critical, qualitative analysis, and I’d like to better understand why. Is there a shared belief that most quantitative youth studies haven’t generally and significantly benefited youth? Is there something about youth work that makes it particularly difficult to usefully quantify – like stories need to be collected in a way that doesn’t dilute their essence? Does qualitative research better embody the five YDev anchors?

On page 231, Maxwell talks about the risk of positivist/instrumentalist questions leading to “uninteresting” conclusions, which reconnected me to my proclivity toward statistics. Sometimes in class we talk about what is interesting and what is not interesting. I sort of find it all interesting. So during this reading, and when introduced to the “research pizza” concept, I imagined I would struggle as a researcher because I would want all the toppings on my pizza! Wouldn’t be the first time this Libra was called indecisive.

System of Care

It was interesting to read the first nine pages from the March 2022 report "Rhode Island Behavioral Health System of Care for Children and Youth."

Learning that “Rhode Island ranks 33rd in overall child behavioral health outcomes,” and “in the majority of behavioral health metrics, RI ranks worse than the US average” (according to America’s Health Rankings) was a bit of a shock. I’ve always heard that RItecare was a standout program, ensuring all RI children have access to insurance, but I understand that health insurance is not health care.

The RI Executive Office of Health & Human Services plea for health care providers “to continue to comment on and participate in the ongoing review of the system,” stood out as a constructivist intention of the authors for the System of Care to evolve, sort of like how the framers of the U.S. The Constitution recognized a need for amendments. As I continued to read, I became increasingly curious to know if providers continued to help revise the system. I wonder if all providers are aware of this opportunity. I'm curious to know how the revision process works, and if the System of Care has been implemented and what effects may be evident.

A few words I associate with research and data are:

Numbers, science, facts, complicated