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The student affair organizational dissertation: a bounded qualitative meta-study.

Article Excerpt
The purpose of this study was to examine dissertations over the past five years that focused on student affairs organizational issues. A bounded qualitative meta-study was used and the methods, theories, and findings of the dissertations were examined. A variety of research methods were used including quantitative, qualitative and mixed designs. Theories invoked by the research also varied and reflected theories from traditional organizational literature and frameworks specific to the student affairs literature. An inductive analysis of the dissertation topics resulted in four basic themes: directionality and restructuring of student affairs - a move to the academic, student affairs management issues, student affairs organizations and cultural values, and student affairs organizations and special groups.

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Student affairs organizations have historically been a part of the higher education enterprise. These organizations have developed into complex structures and play an increasing important role in the matriculation and retention of students as well as contributing to the overall culture of the institution. Given the importance of student affairs organizations, the question this research addresses is what are graduate research projects, the dissertation, contributing to the understanding of the organizational issues associated with student affairs work in higher education. A bounded qualitative meta-study using document analysis will guide the efforts to respond to this important question.

New frameworks are emerging (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001) to explore and synthesize research and to answer specific research questions. An often used approach has been to pose a research question and then proceed with a comprehensive search of all available research. Most often this approach is framed as a quantitative meta-analysis (Glass, 1976) and carries out procedures using "effect size data [to] permit meaningful numerical comparisons and analysis across the studies" (Lipsey & Wilson, 2001, p. 8).

This study uses a bounded qualitative meta-study framework which diverges from the typical quantitative meta-analysis in three important ways:

(1) the study is bounded by a search of a specific research "genre" - the doctoral dissertation,

(2) the study is qualitative in its approach using qualitative document analysis (Altheide, Coyle, DeVriese, & Schneider, 2008) as the method for the study, and

(3) the meta-study approach presented by Paterson, Thorne, Canam & Jillins (2001) serves as the structuring device to focus on methods, theory, and findings.

The Research Question

The research question for this study "What can we learn from the examination of recent doctoral dissertation research on the topic of organizational issues associated with student affairs structures within higher education?"--will be addressed from the foregoing framework (bounded and qualitative). In addition, the Paterson, et. al. (2001) meta-framework directs attention to three sub-questions: "What are the attributes of the research and researcher (methods); what are the theories invoked by...

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