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“Have You Been Non-compliant?” Dilemmas of Decision-Making for School Principals and Education Researchers

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Navigating the Education Research Maze

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Education Research Methods ((PSERM))

Abstract

This chapter explores decision-making dilemmas for school principals through an education research study of risk-taking in such decision-making that in itself was difficult to negotiate for both the principals participating in the study and the researcher. The researcher asked principals to expose whether they had made decisions that were non-compliant with government policy requirements. Such decisions involve risk as principals may be exposed to criticism for non-compliance with established policy when they are unable to meet conflicting requirements, or when negative outcomes arise from decision-making. This created a dilemma for principals about whether to participate and respond to the question “Have you been non-compliant?” and for the researcher in undertaking the study and posing a question where there was risk of non-disclosure by the participants.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, QLD, Australia

    Karen Trimmer

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  1. Karen Trimmer
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Central Queensland University, North Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia

    Dolene Rossi

  2. University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia

    Francis Gacenga

  3. University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia

    Patrick Alan Danaher

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Trimmer, K. (2016). “Have You Been Non-compliant?” Dilemmas of Decision-Making for School Principals and Education Researchers. In: Rossi, D., Gacenga, F., Danaher, P. (eds) Navigating the Education Research Maze. Palgrave Studies in Education Research Methods. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39853-2_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39853-2_3

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-39852-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-39853-2

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

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