- What are some of the ethical issues that you are grappling with in your research? What are some of the ways in which you are responding to these questions?
I was grappling with the ethical implications of interviewing and interacting with minors in the beginning of my project because I wanted to conduct site visits to schools. My goal was to get first hand accounts of the student experience of learning Latin, however the process to receive approval from the Department of Education’s IRB Office would be too lengthy given the time constraints of the program. Thus, I have pivoted to adult interviews in an oral history format in order to give the most amount of space and autonomy to my interviewees as possible.
- As you continue your research, have you considered alternative viewpoints in your investigation? If so, how have these alternative viewpoints enriched or changed your project?
I think I have considered alternative viewpoints in the breadth of my study. Before I was aiming to make more broad strokes conclusions about the presence of Latin in schools dependent on borough. However, based on the feedback that I received from my mentor and other peers, I am hoping that individual interviews will be able to speak better in demonstrating how the impact of Latin instruction can be very case by case and that is in fact the crux of the issue. In short, individual experiences may better lend themselves to exposing the inaccessible nature of a Classics curriculum on a wider scale. I am still excited to analyze the quantitative data of ELA scores in order to get a better picture of literacy, especially how it’s defined by the state, borough to borough.