This article responds to recent calls for greater clarity and transparency regarding methods in qualitative research. On the basis of a 3-year ethnographic study of the overrepresentation of minorities in special education, the authors address key tenets of grounded theory and attempt to reconcile some of the methodological challenges inherent in naturalistic inquiry. They discuss theoretical considerations and use a visual model to illustrate how they applied grounded theory to this complex and sensitive topic. Emphasizing the social nature of decision making in special education, the authors point to the appropriateness of qualitative methods to the investigation of such issues.

Based on a study of the special education placement process in a large city in the United States and two studies in different regions of Spain, the authors offer a comparative analysis of the relationship between professional beliefs and practices and the achievement of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students. The data focus on African American and Hispanic students in the United States and on Gitano (Gypsy) and Moroccan students in Spain. Although professional attitudes in both countries revealed deficit views of CLD students, a key concern in Spain was professionals' assumption that students' cultural assimilation was a requirement for success. In the United States, deficit views, entwined with the entrenched categorical approach to school-based disabilities, contributed to ethnic disproportionality in special education. The studies illustrate how the hegemony of mainstream culture and language in schooling contributes to inappropriate academic and social exclusion for students from historically oppressed minority groups.

Researchers have expressed concern about implementation fidelity in intervention research but have not extended that concern to assessment fidelity, or the extent to which pre-/posttests are administered and interpreted as intended. When studying reading interventions, data gathering heavily influences the identification of students, the curricular components delivered, and the interpretation of outcomes. However, information on assessment fidelity is rarely reported. This study examined the fidelity with which individuals paid to be testers for research purposes were directly observed administering and interpreting reading assessments for middle school students. Of 589 testing packets, 45 (8% of the total) had to be removed from the data set for significant abnormalities and another 484 (91% of the remaining packets) had correctable errors only found in double scoring. Results indicate reading assessments require extensive training, highly structured protocols, and ongoing calibration to produce reliable and valid results useful in applied research.

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Extracted from a larger study of the educational evaluation profession, this qualitative analysis explores how evaluator identity is shaped with constant reference to political economy, knowledge work, and personal history. Interviews with 24 social scientists who conduct or have conducted evaluations as a major part of their careers examined how they came to recognize themselves as adept evaluators. The paper explores four adaptations to program evaluation-higher education faculty who define themselves as academic entrepreneurs whose work is largely funded by evaluation contracts; post-academics who seek intellectual freedom beyond the university; professional evaluators who perceive themselves as intimately connected to contract research organizations; and layover evaluators who are waiting for the next career move. The paper concludes with a discussion of implications for the professional development and academic training of future program evaluators.