Kensington Research Institute

Services -- Part 1

Planning and Getting Started

There are many ways in which KRI can help you to plan your research or evaluation project and to get it off the ground.  Among other things, we can assist with the preparation and/or review of your initial grant proposal, helping you to select a research or evaluation design that is most appropriate to your study needs, conduct workshops on a variety of topics such as incorporating qualitative data into your research or evaluation study design, among others.  For more details, please see below.

 

Grant Proposal Review / Grant Proposal Writing

            No question about it:  grant writing is both a skill and, to some extent, an art. 

             Over the years, a number of clients have contracted our services to help them

             write parts of their grant applications for them.  For example, suppose you have a

             project you wish to conduct and are in the process of preparing a grant

             application to have this project funded.  You know a lot about what you want to

             do and about the services that you want to offer, but you are not as skilled at

             writing up the required data management and data analysis sections of your grant

             proposal.  KRI can help you write those sections . . . or, if you prefer, you could

             hire us to have us write them for you.   As another example, perhaps KRI has

             helped you to develop a study design for a project that you are proposing.  We

             could collaborate with you to write up the description of the proposed

             methodological approach in terms that will be appealing to grant reviewers.

             In addition, a number of clients have contracted KRI's services to review their

             completed applications and provide them with expert critique.  Known in the

             grant/contract industry as "red teaming," we have provided such reviews/critiques

             on many subsequently-funded projects in a variety of subject areas:  providing

             mental health services to children with Turret's Syndrome, providing support

             services to youths recently diagnosed with cancer, assessing the effectiveness of

             treatment for opiate-dependent drug abusers, evaluating the extent of alcohol

             abuse among elderly persons, and developing a screener for domestic violence,

             among others.  In this capacity, assigned KRI staff will read through your

             completed proposal carefully, and then identify for you scientific issues that may

             be problematic for grant reviewers.  In all instances where we believe concerns

             could be raised, we will provide you with an explanation of why the issue at hand

             is likely to be problematic.  Wherever possible, we will also make specific

             recommendations as to how any problems we identify might be remedied, so as

             to avert problems during the grant review process.  During our proposal review

             process, we will also read your proposal for "readability" issues like sentence

             clarity, complexity versus simplicity of the writing, overall persuasiveness of the

             arguments being made, as well as the use of proper grammar, spelling, and

             punctuation.  The completed, reviewed document will be returned to you with

             written comments designed to help you submit the best proposal possible.  Of

             course, we also make ourselves available to you after we complete our review of

             your proposal, should you have any questions about our suggestions/remarks

             and/or wish further assistance with the development or revision of your proposal.

 

Research Design / Study Design

            Relying upon our many years of experience in the field of social science research,

             KRI can help you to choose an effective research design or an evaluation study

             approach that will enable you to accomplish your main project goals.  In the past,

             we have collaborated with colleagues and clients to develop a number of different

             types of projects using a variety of methodologies.  One example entailed

             designing a pilot study of HIV risk practices among drug injectors who used

             shooting galleries.  There, we opted for a "community gatekeepers" approach to

             gaining access to the eligible study participants for this difficult-to-reach

             population, and then relied upon indigenous outreach workers to identify and

             recruit people to take part in the study.  On another project whose main goal was

             to evaluate the effectiveness of drug treatment for adolescents, we developed an

             evaluation study that enabled us not only to examine what aspects of treatment

             worked for what "kinds" of teenagers, but also to compare the effectiveness of

             treatment for youths who did and those who did not receive performance

             incentives.  This particular project included both quantitative and qualitative

             research methodologies, and incorporated an evaluation plan that would take

             into account both types of data.  On a very different project involving no human

             subjects, the study goal was to identify what the types of messages to which

             people are exposed when they watch the media.  That project necessitated the

             development of a quantitative content analysis study design that, ultimately, led

             to the development of four separate databases worth of information.  

              Regardless of what your research and evaluation-related goals are, we at KRI can

             help you to determine an appropriate and effective way of meeting them.

 

Workshops on Incorporating Qualitative Data into a Research or Evaluation Design

            Many people understand the merits of collecting and analyzing quantitative

             data--that is, questionnaire-type data--when they are conducting research,

             intervention, or evaluation studies.  Such information is concrete, specific, and for

             the most part, straightforward to interpret and understand.

             What quantitative data overlooks, though, is that there are many facets to the

             research and evaluation process that do not lend themselves so easily or so

             "neatly" to pre-designed, pre-determined questions.  In fact, a great deal of

             valuable information often arises as a project unfolds, and oftentimes, it takes the

             form of information that nobody thought to ask about when the study was being

             designed.  Trends change and new ones emerge.  It is not uncommon for a

             pre-designed questionnaire to be unable to collect information about new trends

             because they were unforeseeable when the project began.  Collecting qualitative

             data along with the quantitative data can be an invaluable way of capturing this

             information and including it as an integral part of your evaluation and research

             project.

             In addition, it is commonplace--many scholars would even go so far as to say that

             it is unavoidable--for things generally considered to be external to the data

             collection or project implementation process to have a profound impact upon the

             data that are collected.  Many aspects of human interactions, interpersonal

             dynamics, institutional practices, company norms, and individuals' beliefs or

             attitudes affect how people respond (or fail to respond) to questions asked of

             them during an interview, how they receive (or fail to receive) information

             presented to them, how well they master (or fail to master) skills being taught to

             them, and so forth.  Quantitative data collection is ill-suited to identify these

             factors.  Qualitative data, on the other hand, can be used to capture much of this

             information, and to help put general day-to-day happenings into their proper

             context regarding how they affect your project.

            Also worth noting, qualitative data can be used to fill in the gaps between the

            specifics inquired about on formal questionnaires.  Twenty or forty or eighty or

            any number of specific (i.e., quantitative) questions can be used to learn about a

            person's drug-using behaviors, for example.  But there is nothing quite like

            allowing someone to speak openly, in an unstructured manner, about his or her

            drug use to learn about how it feels to use drugs, why he or she chooses to use

            drugs in some situations but not others, how others in one's life react to one's

            drug usage, how one's drug use affects other aspects of one's life, and so forth. 

            When they are used together, quantitative and qualitative data often provide a very

            rich context for understanding the things of interest to a research, intervention, or

            evaluation study.  

           At KRI, we believe that much of the finest social science research conducted utilizes

           both methodologies.  We can help you to learn about how you can enhance your

           own quantitatively-oriented project by including the collection of qualitative data as

           well.  We can work with you to include qualitative data collection as part of your

           overall study design.  If you like, we can train your staff members on the value of

           collecting qualitative data and show them how to do this.