14-25 January 2013
Stellenbosch University
South Africa
Another successful Summer School in Social Science Research Methods was held by the African Doctoral Academy (ADA) in partnership with the International Political Science Association (IPSA) at the University of Stellenbosch/South Africa from January 14 to 25, 2013.
The following one week courses were presented:
- Research designs in the social sciences (J. Mouton – Stellenbosch University)
- Introduction to SPSS (C. Steenekamp – Stellenbosch University)
- Introduction to qualitative data analysis with ATLAS.ti (L. Wildschut – Stellenbosch University)
- Introduction to survey methods and sampling (J. Vorster – Stellenbosch University)
- Comparative research designs and comparative methods (D. Berg-Schlosser – Phillipps University Marburg)
- Introduction to multivariate statistics (B. Kittel – University of Vienna)
- Evaluation research (J. Mouton & L. Wildschut – Stellenbosch University)
- Basic statistics and data analysis with SPSS (N. Boshoff – Stellenbosch University)
- Advanced qualitative data analysis with ATLAS.ti (S. Friese – Qualitative Research and Consulting, Berlin )
- Interview techniques and analyses (M. Bergman – University of Basel)
- Multiple regression analysis (B. Kittel – University of Vienna)
- Doing grounded theory- based on observation, interviewing and evidence from documents (W. Patzelt – Technical University Dresden)
123 delegates from 22 countries attended. This represents an increase of 35% in the number of participants since the previous school.
The ADA moved to its new premises now, and the scope for better service delivery could be fulfilled.
Ratings from the delegates indicate an overwhelming positive response to the Summer School. Here is a summary of the feedback on the ratings for general aspects of the courses:
- 84% attended a course on the respective subject for the first time
- 90% considered the objectives of the course to be clearly set out and that the content matched the objectives
- For 32% of the delegates, the course content was new in its entirety
- 80% would “very highly” (highest rating) recommend the course to a colleague
- 36% found the course materials “very good” (highest rating), 51% “good” , 1% “poor” whilst 12% had “no opinion”
- 79% “strongly agreed” (highest rating) that the presenter was adequately prepared, whilst 4% “agreed” and 17% had “no opinion”.
Some individual comments included the following:
- Enjoyable and very worthwhile.
- This was the most worthy experience in my academic life.
- Coordination very helpful. Learning experience contributing positively to my needs: teaching undergraduate students & supervising projects and also gave clarity to my own research project for PhD and future research.
- A really wonderful experience. Well-organised and smoothly run. Excellent lectures.
- It was a superb experience, would like to come back! All the best for the ADA team!
- It was good to get a well informative revision on research designs as well as deep insights and discussion on M&E as the info assisted me in refining my proposal
- A great experience. A wake-up call on preparations for further studies.
- So far, it has been very worthy and rewarding to be part of the ADA programme. The experience and knowledge acquired will be very useful in my research and teaching.
- Excellent. Will consider several courses.
- I have learnt a lot. It is a very good programme
- Well done!
- It is very professionally managed and it provides a good experience to the participants.
- Thank you for the opportunity
- Well organised, look forward to next year
