Of Magic Doors There Is This….

Diane Stephens prepared the following talk for the 2000 NCTE Conference in Milwaukee upon receiving the Alan C. Purves Award, presented to the RTE article from the previous year’s volume judged most likely to have an impact on the practice of others. In her talk Stephens considers the doubts she has had about the design of the award winning study, focusing especially on a researcher’s obligation to help the teachers with whom the researcher is working, even at the risk of jeopardizing a study’s design. Stephens traces the way that her engagement with that question has led to her current professional commitments.