Prof. Eugene P. Sheehan started his workshop by wishing everyone a happy St. Patrick’s Day and also introducing himself. The workshop led to participants through the various steps in the design, conduct, analysis and publication of impactful research. Research question development is a critical component of the research process and participants will reflect on meaningful research topics, whether practical or theoretical. This will be followed by the development of appropriate research design and data analysis and interpretation strategies. He began by explaining what impactful research is. It could be a significant or measurable effect that solves important problems and advances basic knowledge. Impactful research is characterized by rigorous methodology, replicable, usually highly cited and very rewarding to yourself. He explained where to begin and how to choose a research topic. The characteristics of a good research question was discussed; They should be interesting to you, clear specific and researchable. There are specific research questions, like what is the impact of personalized learning strategies on student academic achievement in high school math classrooms. He then explained about the literature reviews and how to conduct a thorough literature review, by looking at existing meta-analyses, key phrases entered into data bases including google scholar and various subject networks. The pyramid of exempt, expedited and full board was used to explain the levels of IRB review. In research design there are factors influencing the type of research design and the competence and preference makes you think ahead to data analysis and publication. When you put your data together you need to know what you will be doing with it. Qualitative data isn’t easy to analyze. 28 Next, the write up and publication was spoken about. It is basically when you get to tell your research story.

The framework for the write up already exists in the literature review, research questions, data analysis. So, you can begin by summarizing the existing literature and your study like you would tell, a friend what you have been doing. Summary tips were given including important impactful question, clearly developed ideas, current literature review, appropriate methodology, correct data analysis and clear writing. The next step of journal work was elaborated upon. You need to select an appropriate journal, one where there is overlap between your work and that or the journal. You are expected to make revisions and expect rejection over your career. There was a question answering session conducted. He congratulated everyone on a successful conference and hoped everyone had a great networking session as well. He once again wished everyone a happy St. Patrick’s Day.