Research Methods Individual Presentation Assessment Brief | CCCU

Assignment task

This assessment is an individual presentation of the research proposal that presents student’s ability to effectively communicate the idea, objectives and research methodology of the planned research project and justify chosen research design. The students are expected to logically substantiate theoretical framework for preliminary research and research methodology, choice of data to be collected and analysed, methods and procedures to complete the research, as well as the research timeline and its feasibility.

Depending on the context, the presentation of the research proposal might be needed in a range of situations either in the employment in tourism sector or in an academic setting, where students will need to solve a theoretical and/or practical problem. Therefore, the ability to orally present a research proposal in a clear, concise and convincing way and support the presentation with effective and appealing slides is an essential component of professional skillset of the would-be Bachelor in Business and Tourism Management. Another essential skill is ability to handle questions effectively, demonstrate readiness to provide additional details and justify choices and decisions.

Individual presentation of the research proposal is the final assignment in Level 5, and logically prepares students to undertaking a dissertation at Level 6. By presenting this assignment, students must demonstrate they have achieved their learning objectives, i.e. have knowledge and understanding of approaches to research design and are able to evaluate the usefulness of various methods and techniques for primary data-gathering and analysis, ethical, practical and theoretical considerations and limitations of their research. 

This assignment has been designed to provide you with an opportunity to demonstrate your achievement of the following module learning outcomes:

LO 1 Define and justify an appropriate business-related research issue to investigate empirically.
LO 2 Explain and critically evaluate the main social scientific research methodologies and methods appropriate for the business.
LO 3 Draw on relevant academic literature and appropriate data sources to develop and evaluate insights from published materials related to chosen research area.
LO 4 Demonstrate an informed understanding on key ethical considerations of conducting research projects.
LO 5 Demonstrate appropriate academic writing skills, referencing and good academic practice and make decisions on organising material in a logical and coherent way with an audience in mind.

Task requirements

Overview of the assignment

Individual presentation of the research proposal will repeat the research proposal in some parts, but will substantially develop the following parts: 
-Rationale for the research, stating and justifying the research problem, aim, objectives and research approach.
-Theoretical framework as the basis for the literature review.
-Previous research, gap in the research or evidence of the research necessity, e.g. from reports.
-Research methodology.
-Proposed outcomes of the research and personal contribution.

Consequently, this assignment provides the opportunity for students to demonstrate the ability to understand and interpret information relevant to the research methodology and present it to a variety of audiences in both academic and business environments in a written form as a 2000 words research proposal with required appendices.

You will need to prepare a Power Point presentation and present the proposal orally. You must be able to respond questions concerning theoretical framework, previous research, gap in the research, practical and theoretical implications with appropriate referencing to the relevant primary and secondary resources. You will need to justify your interest and your role in the future research.

Referencing and research requirements

Please reference your work according to the Canterbury Harvard style guidance which you can access on Moodle. Include at least 15 references. In addition to the research proposal, you will need to use more references for the theoretical framework to explain key theories and concepts and provide evidence of the research problem. Overall, the presentation will refer to more than 20 academic and business resources.

Submission details

This assignment should be submitted electronically via Moodle (module tutors will discuss this process with you during class time). 

Please ensure that your work has been saved in an appropriate file format (Microsoft Word). You PowerPoint presentation will have speaker notes and then will be saved as the Word Document Handouts with speaker notes below slides (see the instruction enclosed in Appendix C.)

Please, note, that you CANNOT submit the set of images of slides and images of speaker notes, as this will be viewed as Academic Misconduct and the attempt to avoid similarity check on Turnitin. Your submitted text on the slides and the speaker notes must be editable, and not in the textbox or frame.

The text in the slides and the speaker notes as well as the scheme of the theoretical framework, and the materials in the appendices to the proposal, will comprise the total of 2000 words. Please, note, that you do not need to repeat all the text of the proposal in the speaker note sand the slides, though some parts will be repeated. However, some parts will require different presentation than in the research proposal.
You can submit your work as many times as you like before the submission date. If you do submit your work more than once, your earlier submission will be replaced by the most recent version.
 
Once you have submitted your work, you will receive a digital receipt as proof of submission, which will be sent to your forwarded e-mail address (provided you have set this up). Please keep this receipt for future reference, along with the original electronic copy of your assignment 

You are reminded of the University’s regulations on academic misconduct, which can be viewed on the University website: Academic Misconduct Policy. In submitting your assignment, you are acknowledging that you have read and understood these regulations.

Assignment Guide – Individual Presentation

You will create your own template to the PowerPoint presentation. 
The structure of the presentation below is tentative, and students have autonomy to decide where they need more slides. However, the total presentation must not exceed 15 slides.

Title (1 slide)

To ensure that your title and topic point directly to the focus of your research, check to see that key terms in the statement of the gap in the literature and the research aim are reproduced in the title.

Research problem or justification (1-2 slides)

Description of your research – what, how, why (the research needs to be done)
What issue, problem, controversy, or important matter has led to research on the topic and set your research into wider context of the discipline.

Theoretical framework (2 slides)

Theoretical framework will be presented as a model or a flowchart and supported by detailed description in the speaker notes. It will justify three topics investigated further in the Literature Review. 
In summary, the theoretical framework model and literature review are interconnected in the research process. The literature review informs the development of the theoretical framework by identifying relevant theories and concepts, integrating them into a coherent framework, and establishing the conceptual basis for the research study. In this presentation students need to demonstrate the Theoretical framework model not actually the literature review.
As an option, you may have 1 slide for Theoretical framework, and 1 slide for Conceptual Framework, both presented as mind maps, or flowcharts, or as models. To create mind-maps / flowcharts you are advised to use instruments presented in slides 39-44, Week 1, Day 1.
References are mandatory. Resources, not used in the research proposal, are needed in this section of the presentation. 

Gap in the literature or evidence of the problem from reports, etc. (1 slide)

Outlines the field of literature and the ‘gap’, the main findings to date, theories, debates, and remaining questions within the literature, and explains how the research will contribute to the gap. References are mandatory.

Research aim, research objective and a research question (1 slide)

Outline the focus or names the specific knowledge the research methodology aims to generate.

What will you need to know to answer the research question? How can you find this out?

• Explain the research design and methodology: qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods.
• Clarify the correlations between the research objectives and the chosen approach.

Research method and methodology (4-5 slides)

Explain what you will do to achieve the research aim or reach your conclusions. You might consider the following:

-Data and resources.
-Possible collaboration with organisations and institutions in the tourism sector in the UK. Or educational/research institutions.
-Budget.
-Research design and choice of research methods.
-Samling design: the population or sample from which participants will be selected; location of the sample; the sample size; how the sample will be selected; surveys, questionnaires, including the one(s) you created, and tests used; how the data generated will be analysed. 
-Choice/creation of research instruments, including online platforms, applications or software needed to a) collect data; b) analyse data.
-Your personal role in the research, your readiness (previous experience, research, training?). You need to explain and persuade your audience that you are the right person to complete the research, and competent enough to resolve the research problem.
-Understanding legislation.
-Ethics and confidentiality: Does your research involve people? Can you get enough data? How will you keep it confidential? Health and Safety considerations.

Summary or statement of proposed outcomes of the research (1 slide)

Research timeline (1 slide). 

Justify the research feasibility. Explain practical limitations and how you plan to deal with them.

You will have 10 minutes to present the research proposal orally, and 10 minutes to respond questions.

References must be clearly readable in the speaker notes. References are not included in the word count.

Appendix A

Appendix B. Individual Presentation of the Research Proposal: Marking rubrics

Appendix C

Instruction on exporting the Power Point Presentation slides and speaker notes into Word Document Handouts