Your research design proposal should pose a question that addresses a relevant topic in Public Administration and provides a detailed proposal for how to answer that question. You do not have to collect or analyze data for this project, although you may provide some descriptive statistics for illustration purposes. Your final research design proposal should include the following elements:
I. Introduction: Briefly discuss your topic and its importance and provide a very brief overview of what your paper will cover. Provide a clear statement of your research question. This question should be clearly situated in the field of Public Administration and should be one that can be reasonably be executed in one semester as a Capstone project.
II. Literature review: Provide background research on this topic or other similar topics if none exists as of yet on your particular question. You need to include at least 8 peer reviewed academic journal articles. You may include additional sources, but you should be cautious and use only reputable sources. Newspaper articles, blogs, websites, etc are not appropriate for this research.
III. Methods: Provide a detailed discussion of how you would answer your research question. Identify and define all variables and hypotheses. Identify potential data sources including relevant links to online content. If you would need to collect your own data, provide instruments you could use to do so. Discuss appropriate methods of analysis to answer your question and explain WHY this is the most appropriate method of analysis.
IV. Conclusion: Recap the project as well as its importance. Discuss limitations you might face when answering this problem.
Additional Guidelines: Your paper should be about 15 pages, double spaced. Cite all outside sources. Use only reputable sources. You can use any citation format as long as you are consistent throughout the paper. Final papers must be submitted to D2L no later than April 27, at 9 PM.