ABSTRACT
Chuck Schmidt gave the keynote address at the 1998 Southeastern Music Education Symposium in Athens, Georgia (Schmidt, 1998). Entitled “Theory, Methodology, and Analysis in Music Education Research: A Reviewer’s Perspective,” his address encouraged those in attendance to critically examine the quality of the research done by music education researchers:
Chuck had much to say in his address about (1) writing effective, critical literature reviews, (2) verifying measurement validity and reliability, (3) establishing credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability in qualitative studies, (4) paying attention to statistical assumptions, statistical power, and Type I and Type II errors, and (5) crafting discussion sections that clearly link the study results to the theoretical basis of the study. This essay discusses just one issuechoosing a quality research question, something discussed by Chuck and other leading music education researchers for decades, and places this discussion within the context of the recommendations by Boyer (1990) and others who call for a new vision of scholarship. This chapter’s intent is to suggest ways in which music education research could be aligned with current discussions of “engaged scholarship” and could be more influential to individuals outside of the music education research community.
