Research Methods for

Community Researchers

so excited you are here!!

This site is your guide to the community researcher training! We are beyond excited you have joined our team and hope this is only the beginning of your journeys as researchers! Watch this short video about the training and what to expect.

Why?

The purpose of this training is to prepare you to conduct research for the project with Urban Institute about Credible Messenger programming. However, we want to give you the tools to conduct research and evaluation beyond this project!

Learning Objectives

By the end of this project, you will be able to:

1) Explain how research helps us understand issues related to the criminal legal-system

2) Describe common research methods (i.e., quantitative and qualitative)

3) Develop a focus group script

4) Assist in creating a life event calendar (LEC) survey

5) Conduct focus groups and LEC surveys with youth/young adults in your community

6) Analyze and share research findings

What we will do:

This website houses interactive modules for each topic. You can access this website and content on any device with internet access: a laptop. Smartphone, or tablet.

Each module contains items and articles to read, videos to watch, and activities to complete, such as short Quizzes. Each module should take you about 20-30 minutes to complete. We let you know what content/activities are optional and you can skip if you do not have the time/capacity.

You can complete modules and learn at your own pace, but have a general guide for how many modules to complete each month. We will review some of the module content together during our monthly meetings.

We have the option to share our reactions and thoughts in a communal Discord discussion. More information about Discord is provided below. You can reflect on the content privately in your own notes and/or on Discord!

You can ask questions on Discord or to your buddy anytime!

Getting Started

Throughout this training, you will be asked to 1) watch videos, 2) read articles, and 3) reflect on what you learned through personal reflections or discussions with other community researchers on Discord or Zoom. The training is self-paced, but we hope you will complete the modules we ask by our site monthly meetings (1-3 modules at a time). Near the end of the training, we will work on more hands-on activities such as developing research instruments and collecting data.

Getting to Know the Teams!

Our CM project is three years long and focuses on Phoenix, AZ, King County, WA, Jackson, MS and NYC, NY. Below we introduce the team for each project. You will be training around the same time and wanted to give the opportunity for you all to connect!

CM2: Understanding the Implementation and Impact of Credible Messenger Mentoring on Youth Across Settings (Phoenix, Seattle, NYC, NY and Jackson, MS)