Action Research SIG Meeting Minutes
April 6, 2014
6:15pm to 7:30pm
This page is designed to capture the highlights of the SIG meeting and inform members who were not able to attend.
Introductions:
2014 officers
• Donna Johnson 2014 - Chair of SIG
• Debby Zambo - Secretary
• Linnea Rademaker - Program Chair
• Margaret Riel - Webmaster
2013 SIG officers
• Dannelle Stevens - Past Chair of SIG
• Barabara Kauwlich - Secretary
• Lonnie Rowell - Program Chair
• Margaret Riel - Webmaster
Reports:SIG Chair:
Dannelle: Reported on the findings for her informal study (surveys and interviews with editors) on 3 questions.
• QUESTION 1. Please name which journals by name that you think (or know from
experience) are receptive to action research studies.
• Findings: Educational Action Research, Action in Teacher Education, The High
School Journal, Journal of Family Diversity in Education, inquiry in education,
Environment Educational Research, Applied Environmental Education, South
African Journal of Education, Journal of Research in Education, Action Research
International, Entrepreneurship Research Journal, Educational Research for
Social Change, Journal of Education, Teaching Education
• QUESTION 2. What challenges have you had publishing action research?
• Findings: Locating peer-reviewed journals. Important to maintain flexibility
in action research even if many journals are not open to that. Reviewers not
understand the contextuality of action research. In South Africa we have to
publish in ISI and IBSS journals and only Action Research meets this criteria.
Not many journals that appreciate or accept AR Bring AR to entrepreneurship
• QUESTION 3.What else would you like to know or say about doing action?
•Findings: Would it be possible to develop a list of journals that accept AR research? -
asked by four different people! How to get more journals that accept AR on ISI
list (Identify those we collect as being on the ISI list.
Report from the Treasurer:
• Beginning balance……………………………. $16,111.
• New members…………………. +$3015.
• ARNA sponsorship …………….. -$1000.
• AERA Awards Session …………… -$350.
• 2013 Conference Expenses.. - $12,955.
• AERA SIG Management Fee…… - $300.
• Balance JANUARY 2014…………………..………. $4,915.
Program Chair/Outreach Coordinator’s Report: Lonnie Rowell
• number of submissions - slight decline but near numbers in the past
• had a solid core of reviewers
• Over the past few years, we have tried to host events in partnership with
community based organizations and others doing good work in an area of action
research in the cities where AERA’s annual meeting are being held.
• A major problem is that people commit and do not follow through, or don’t get
involved at all. We need new members to join this committee and to work with
Lonnie to do outreach to potential partners, and to organize a collaborative event
for the upcoming 2015 annual meeting in Chicago.
• Last year’s attempt continued encouragement for this type of session at outreach
had mixed results (few attendees at the San Francisco conference attempt – but well
liked by those who attended). The previous year was highly successful. We want another
successful event.
Report from the Webmaster: Margaret Riel
Demonstration of the AERA website http://sites.google.com/site/aeraarsig.
It functions is an interactive site designed to be jointly managed by SIG members. All are
encouraged to make our site their own by co - managing the Wiki.
Members must be invited in order to gain clearance required to co-manage Wiki.
Interested persons should contact mriel@pepperdine.edu. The traffic to the site is about
15 visits a day (450 a month) with each visitor looking at 2.3 pages and spending a bit more
than a minute a page (on the average). Most of our visitors are new people which
means that there is a great deal of interest in action research.
Member Proposals:
• To institute SIG awards: 1) Dissertation Award, 2) Best Paper Award, and 3)
Practitioner Award. A proposal will be submitted the Executive Committee by
• Revisit Election Procedures: Bylaws change to reflect new election procedures.
Proposed structure:
- New officers would serve for one year, then complete re-election process.
- Officers elected for a two-year term.
- Shadow officers elected at the end of the first year of officers’ two year term,
- Also a proposal to change committees to an advisory council with council
to request approval to create new awards to be trained by current officers.
Developing New Committees
A call was made for new committee members. Volunteers brainstormed ideas. Anyone
wishing to join one of these groups should contact the person below.
1. Community Outreach (works to connect the SIG to the local context so AERA
presentations and other functions can be arranged) - This group needs a new
leader! Interested persons should contact the SIG chair – Dr. Donna Johnson
djphoenix46@yahoo.com.
2. Bylaws (works to update and keep track of bylaws) – The committee is presently
working to amend bylaws to reflect proposal for shadow officers (See Committee
Report below). Donna Johnson djphoenix46@yahoo.com
3. AR Journals (works to explicate journals to publish action research)- Dannelle
Stevens bgsd@PDX.EDU
4. Awards (working to develop Best Paper criteria and establish other awards
for practitioners, graduate students, and faculty) - Linnea Rademaker
Lrademaker2@gmail.com
5. Website (up keep and expansion) - Margaret Reil mriel@epperdine.edu
6. Graduate Students (working to get graduate students involved in the SIG)– Debby
Zambo debby.zambo@asu.edu
Note: Committees should be active as that is the only way that important work in our SIG
can get done. Leaders are asked to submit a bi-monthly report of their activities to Debby
Zambo, so that she can post progress reports on our website. Reports should be submitted
to Debby on the following dates:
May 15th
,July 15th
September 15th
Thanks you to everyone for your contributions!!!!
Submitted by Debby Zambo