A large, national youth development organization funds local community-based agencies to follow its program model. The adolescents selected for the program must be identified as “high risk,” meaning that they live in an impoverished community, have a single parent, have low grades, have a parent who is or has been incarcerated, and/or are medically fragile.

Big Organization reports the following:

Big Organization is an overwhelming success! Of the youth, 10-17 years old, who participate in our program:
 14% see an increase in their grades,
 43% have better relationships with their peers, and
 31% have better relationships with their parents.

The way that Big Organization comes to this data follows. Big Organization gives the local community-based agencies a form to report on their participants. The social worker at the local agency completes the form. Every six months, for each participant, the social worker reports:

Participant’s grades have:
□ improved a lot □ improved somewhat □ stayed the same □ no data

Participants’ relationships with her/his peers have:
□ improved a lot □ improved somewhat □ stayed the same □ no data

Participants’ relationship(s) with her/his parent(s) have:
□ improved a lot □ improved somewhat □ stayed the same □ no data

Part 1 (4 points)
Identify and explain the problems with Big Organization’s conclusions.

Part 2 (9 points)
You decide that Big Organization’s study is too flawed for you to use, so you design your own study.
Your plan is to test the following research question:

Does participation in a Big Organization affiliated program affect the grades of participants?

Write a corresponding null hypothesis associated with this research question.

Write a directional alternative hypothesis associated with this research question.

Operationalize the independent variable.

Explain how you will gather data for your independent variable (data collection method) and why you will gather it that way (advantages of that data collection method for your purposes).

Explain what level of measurement you will use to gather data about your independent variable and why (advantages of using that level of measurement for your purposes).

Operationalize the dependent variable.

Explain how you will gather data for your dependent variable (data collection method) and why you will gather it that way (advantages of that data collection method for your purposes).

Explain what level of measurement you will use to gather data about your dependent variable and why (advantages of using that level of measurement for your purposes).