ASSESSMENT BRIEF
Subject Code and Title PUBH6012: Capstone B: Applied Research Project in Public Health
Assessment Assessment 1: Report
Individual/Group Individual or Group
Length 5,000 words
Learning Outcomes This assessment addresses the following learning outcomes: 1. Integrate and apply their knowledge and skills in public health 2. Apply research skills to a public health issue 3. Analyse the results of data collected from research, taking into consideration prior evidence and theory 4. Understand the ethical implications for conducting a piece of public health research 6. Create a final research report
Submission By 11:55pm AEST/AEDT Sunday of Week 10
Weighting 80%
Total Marks 100 marks
Context:
This assessment advanced skills in reporting the justification, methods, results, and conclusions of a research project. Key understanding contained includes how to justify a research project using literature, how to implement a research proposal to collect and analyse data, how to report the results of the analysis of data, how to contextualise one's own research in the context of the wider body of literature, and how to draw conclusions about future research and recommendations based on research. This prepares students for the conduct and reporting of research, which is an important skill set for public health practitioners.
Instructions:
Part 1: Due Sunday end of Module 1 Week 1
Based on the feedback from your Capstone A Research Proposal, revise your research plan and GANTT chart.
Submit these to your Capstone A facilitator by Sunday end of Module 1 Week 1. You may not proceed with your data collection until this has been approved by your supervising facilitator.
The final assignment for this subject will be the write-up of the findings of your research into a final report. This will be comprised of the following parts:
1) Abstract
a. Summary of your report (as you would find in a published research article)
2) Introduction
a. Introduction to and justification of the topic area, drawing upon your literature review (from Capstone A), and including the knowledge gap your project addresses
b. Your research question
3) Research design and methods
a. Summarise your research design/methods (from Capstone A) - what type of project did you do?
b. How did you collect the data (ie search strategy and process/ policy consultation process)? If a policy consultation, explain how any organizations/individuals that you consulted with were approached
c. How did you analyse the data (ie thematic analysis, systematic review process, consultation synthesis)?
d. Briefly explain the ethical issues that should be considered
4) Results
a. Report the results of your findings, e.g. key themes if a qualitative study, results in table format if a quantitative study
b. Clearly explain key figures, tables and graphs
5) Discussion: Interpretation and contextualisation of your results
a. Place your results in the context of your literature review
b. Contextualise the results within the academic literature
c. Describe any limitations of your study
6) Conclusion
a. Conclusions from this study
b. Recommendations for future research or policy change based on feasible solutions
7) Supplementary material
a. Reference List
b. Any appendices
This research report format has been based on the standard format for a journal article, and thus may be submitted to a journal in the future if the student is interested.
NOTE: due to the time constraints around submission and peer review, a submitted article will not be required as part of this subject. If you wish to develop a journal article, you may seek advice on how to do this at the end of the Capstone.