ABOUT

Modern meta-analytic methods are needed to understand the conditions necessary to maximize STEM intervention impacts on learning outcomes. Meta-analysis is a suite of techniques that is uniquely positioned to answer important questions about contextual factors related to intervention effects. Unfortunately, traditional applications of meta-analysis in STEM, and education research broadly, focus on identifying average effects across multiple studies. Such applications are helpful but they fail to provide policy-makers and practitioners concrete guidance when effects vary substantially across those studies (i.e., effect heterogeneity). To answer questions related to effect heterogeneity, STEM researchers conducting meta-analyses need a broader set of modern analytical tools, such as methods for handling correlated effect sizes, effect sizes from complex sampling designs, and adjusting for complex patterns of reporting bias.

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The purpose of this 5-day workshop is to provide STEM researchers with a comprehensive, introductory meta-analysis workshop focused on state-of-the-art methods including use of the program R. Like other introductory workshops, the Modern Meta-Analysis Research Institute (MMARI) is targeted at early-career researchers with no previous experience with meta-analysis. Unlike other introductory workshops, the content of this Research Institute will focus on providing the data analysis skills in R to implement best-practice statistical methods.  At the conclusion of the workshop, participants should be able to: use R for meta-analysis; understand differences between effect sizes and compute effect sizes from the most common types of data reported in studies; specify an appropriate meta-analysis model; estimate and report both an average effect size and the extent of variation in effect sizes; explore and interpret heterogeneity of effect sizes using meta-regression models, and conduct appropriate publication bias analyses and interpret the effect of possible bias on findings.