As you all know by now, through this blog site, you will have the opportunity to write about your experiences as college students and veterans of the
The focus of these stories will be the way in which you transitioned from your military job/culture to your post-military job/culture as full-time college students. The aim of this study is to uncover the potential problems and successes college veterans experience as they make this life-changing transition into the academic setting. It is important that you write about your own unique experiences. Don't try to write what you think I want to hear. Just tell YOUR story--for better or for worse.
It is important that you try to be as accurate and detailed as possible, but don't stress too much about it. Try and have some fun with this, and allow yourself to write whatever comes to mind. You are not being graded for correct grammar or anything like that. And, inevitably, there will be things you will have forgotten. That is fine. That point is, again, to write about your own experiences as you remember them.
As a refresher on how this process works, there will be five specific questions for you to use as the starting point for your story. One of these questions will be posted every week.
Answer the questions as accurately as you can, and try to phrase your responses as a story: the way you remember the events unfolding in your life. As I've indicated, you are free to say whatever you like and even go off on unrelated tangents if you wish (but then try and come back to the original topic). However, I do ask that you write at least one page, approximately 300 words, for each question. There is no maximum limit, so you are free to make your stories as long as you please.
You will be expected complete your own unique narrative (story-format) response to the posted questions one week after the question is posted.
Also within the week in which a question is posted, you should read and comment on at least one fellow-participant's posted response to a question posted the previous week. You can say whatever you want in the comment: maybe talk about the similarities or differences between your experiences, give advice, ask for clarification or elaboration on something that may have interested you, or even just comment on a simple recognition of someone else’s experience.
You are free to comment on whichever participant’s story you want, and your comments don’t have to be particularly long (maybe a short paragraph or two). But, like the narratives, you may make them as long as you wish. Additionally, you may comment to as many of the participants’ stories as you want. And you may comment on any post at any time. For instance, as we progress through this process, you may come across an older response that you may have missed or now find more interesting or relevant for whatever reason. Feel free to comment on that older response any time during the study.
And if you want to comment on someone's comments, feel free to do so. You can keep the back and forth dialogue about a specific question with the same person (or people) going as long as you like.
I may also contact you individually (through email or on the telephone) if there is something you wrote about that I feel needs some elaboration or clarification. I will also be contacting each participant individually as the study progresses to insure that my interpretations of your stories (the themes I find in them) are in-line with your actual experience and intended meaning.
This study is designed to last approximately 5 to 7 weeks. Upon completion of the study, I will analyze the data individually for each participant and collectively for the entire group. I will contact each of you individually after I have finished with my analyses concerning your individual story to verify that my interpretation of your story is consistent with your experience (I will be open to any feedback you may have concerning your individual story).
Finally, I will present all the participants with a collective analysis of the entire group's "transition narrative," again to verify that my perceptions and interpretations are consistent with the group's. Like the individual narratives, I will be open to any comments or critiques that anyone may have of the final group analysis.
Finally, after the study is complete, I will sent each participants an email asked them what the experience of being involved in this study was like (you will email your answer to that question back to me).
Feel free to contact me anytime if you have any questions, comments, or concerns regarding how this process will work.
