Towards an ethnographic analysis of a secondary school

Abstract

This field study report is based on data collected in the first year of a three-year project which aims to describe and analyze the reality constructions of the participants in one secondary school. The data presented in the report is incomplete but the report does indicate the complexity of a school as an organization, the social relations which occur in it and the varied perceptions individuals and groups have of the reality and significance of these interactions.

The report begins with a review of the approaches adopted by social theorists and researchers to analyze the way people interact in organizations. The perspectives by which classical organizational theorists, neoclassicists and system theorists study organizations are criticized for failing to provide meaningful insights into particular social interactions. A more fruitful approach to social research is found in the work of Glaser and Strauss, the phenomenologists and educational anthropologists.

The methodology to be employed in the research project is examined closely in chapters 5 and 6.

A general description of the research undertaken in the secondary school in 1975 is followed by an analysis of questionnaire, observation and interview data related to the perceptions of teachers, students and parents about the following areas of investigation: the effects of the school building, facilities and resources on teaching and learning; the nature, purpose and goal orientation of dialogue; decision-making processes; the implementation of decisions; the roles of leaders; teachers and the teaching-learning process ; students and their attitudes to learning; alienation and control; the relationships between parents and students and the extent to which the community generally and parents in particular are able to participate and be involved in the school.

At this stage of the research, I was not able to achieve conceptual closure and any reconstructions of the social reality of the participants of Menzies High made by me in this report must be seriously questioned.

The report concludes by indicating the areas to be investigated in the final two years of the research.

Date of Award	1976
Original language	English