IELTS Research Reports

Wayne Sawyer and Michael Singh3.2 Site studiesThe relevant universities were in Sydney (1), Melbourne (2) and Adelaide (1). For each of theseFaculties, semi-structured interviews were conducted with: academic staff teaching in the courses,course co-ordinators and one Head of Faculty. In addition, a focus group was conducted with onegroup of students in one university, and with one group of academics in another. Representativesof one state teacher registration authority were also interviewed. The interviews were aimed atdetermining views on:1 the English language proficiencies of LBOTE students (specifically those who have beensubject to IELTS testing)2 the degree to which English language proficiency is an issue in the practicum successof these students (relative to other factors such as lack of familiarity with Australianschooling practices)3 the adequacy of current IELTS admissions scores into the relevant courses4 what an adequate IELTS admissions score into teacher education courses might be3.3 Data analysisThe analysis of the interviews and relevant policy texts used established procedures for data reductionverification (Emerson et al 1995; Ezzy 2002; Hatch 2002). Data reduction involved the usualprocedures:1 open coding: assigning labels to meaningful chunks of information (data segments) toanalyse the whole data set2 axial categorisation was used to subdivide this mass of data segments according to theiremergent patterns, relationships and themes3 interpretive summaries were produced focusing on the tentative explanations andconclusions to be drawn from this analysis; these summaries tested the logicalconsistency of claims4 data verification was by means of the research team members’ cross-checking eachother’s analysis to ensure the robustness of conclusions based on supporting evidence.94 www.ielts.org