Katie Sprague shares how working on the PROSPECT grant contributed to her academic growth, highlights her favorite moments from the project, and offers advice for current grad students. She also talks about her next steps after graduation and reflects on her experience as part of the team.
How long did you work on PROSPECT?
I worked on PROSPECT from Summer 2022 to Summer 2024. I was mainly involved in the case study side. Specifically I conducted site visits, contributed to the partnership profiles, and started the initial coding with Community Cultural Wealth and Partnership Capital frameworks.
How did working on the PROSPECT grant contribute to your academic growth?
Through PROSPECT, I have had opportunities to work on research presentations at conferences. I had been fortunate to attend and present at UMKC symposium with several PROSPECT team members while conducting the KCURE site visit. I also attended and presented at AACTE for other STEM related work. During AACTE, I attended sessions that connected to the work that PROSPECT is doing. During one of these sessions, the presenters were discussing some of the challenges of maintaining partnerships with large differing power dynamics. This was particularly insightful because it has been a noticing within several of the PROSPECT site visits.
I’ve also learned valuable researcher skills. I’ve become much more familiar with conducting interviews and how to ask follow-up questions that provide additional context. I’ve learned the importance of looking back at transcripts to verify what was said, not strictly rely on interviewer notes. Also, I’ve learned that team coding is an incredibly important process and can have an enormous time commitment to make progress. PROSPECT has helped me to become a well-rounded researcher.
What was your favorite or most rewarding moment working on the project?
I did not realize how much I was going to enjoy conducting interviews! I remember being very nervous to conduct an interview where I had not created the questions or had much insight to the specific sites – this was before the overview sheets were created. After the interview got going, I was able to find a rhythm and feel much more comfortable. I really appreciated that almost all interviews are conducted with two people so it’s possible to be the note taker and observer before taking the lead. By conducting the interviews, I was able to piece things together when it became time to create the profiles.
What’s next for you now that you have graduated?
I’m graduating in December and will continue to substitute teach in the Omaha area. I plan to apply to various institutions in Nebraska to teach either mathematics courses or pre-service education courses.
Any advice you would like to share with other grad students involved in the project?
I would encourage other graduate students to be get comfortable with not knowing how to do certain aspects of the role. Being a researcher is difficult because it has so many facets and requires many different forms of knowledge. PROSPECT is a team undertaking; if you do not know how to do something, ask! Someone else on the team likely has a wealth of knowledge in that area and is happy to provide support. I would also highly encourage new members to the team to become familiar with the organizational format of the Google Drive. Knowing how to navigate and /or search the Google Drive will save you a significant amount of time.
Thanks,
Katie