Practicum Update

For those of you who may be interested, I've decided to update you on the status of my practicum...and to warn you of the dangers of working with a partner. So we were going along just fine two weeks ago, we had our schedule worked out to have the results written up and analyzed for our client by Monday. This was exciting as it wasn't actually due until Sept. 7th (next wednesday) and my partner kept going off about how they were going to be "blown away" by the work we've done. I nodded complacently and repeated the schedule to her several times. We went our separate ways and met with our advisor last week. One of the things that was holding us up was that the only computers with the software we needed were closed until school started, which to us was way too far away to do any good. Luckily, or so we thought, our advisor had a solution in the form of two copies of the software we could use to download onto our home computers. We parted in high spirits still thinking we could complete the paper on Monday. At this point I was beginning to have some trepidations as my partner had used the wrong format for both our interviews and observations/field notes. We had agreed on what and how to write down our stuff before we began collecting data and she not only didn't do it this way, but didn't observe the right stuff at all. For example: we were supposed to watch and note the movements of visitor groups around the exhibit. Meaning; "asian family approaches, mom, boy -10, girl 6, goes up to table. Girl pickes up ball, etc..." instead my partner made random notes into her digital recorder which she wore around her neck. Stuff like; "people seem to really like the table" or "I wonder if it would be better if we moved such and such..." This is fine for overall themes, but doesn't do us any good if we are trying to report on visitor behavior, with hard numbers (18/42 people did this) to back us up. So when we left our meeting my partner was to go home and convert all of her data so we would have comparable notes to go off of that could be easily inputted into the software (atlas). She went home and converted her interviews (really we had all the same info already, only she had noted what jobs people had, so this wasn't that big of a deal to put that into my already formatted stuff) with no problem. She delivered them to me the next day so I could upload them and returned to convert the other observations.
A word on the observations. I had only observed a few groups as while I was over with her we spent most of our time interviewing people. However all morning I was over at the other exhibit we were evaluating (or should I say "I" was evaluating) thinking that she was over there obser ving people and that my notes would be suppliments to the majority of the stuff she was doing. Okay, so now you have an idea of my expectations of her data.
So I upload the interviews to find that the program our advisor gave us doesn't work. I email my partner and a day later hear back that her disk doesn't work either, but that she's going to try a few things. She constantly refers to herself as a "computer geek" so I'm thinking maybe she can fix it, maybe not, but either way i have to get mine done. So I go up to the school on Saturday and again on Monday night (the monday we thought we'd be done mind you) to upload my data and get some preliminary analysis done. Tuesday I have class all day and am presented with 170 pages of homework to read, 80+ of which needed to be done by Thursday. This is stressful, but I figure I could read it that day, meet with my partner Wednesday (now 1 week before due) and write the paper no problem.
Wednesday we meet. I'm a little late as I've fallen asleep on the couch trying to read my extremely boring homework. We get on the computer to look at partner's data. (I haven't seen it yet though I emailed her my results two days ago, I kept pestering her to email me hers, but she insisted that she was "doing it by hand" since atlas didn't work and it was taking longer than she thought). Okay so we sit down and I look at the screen. Before me is a table that she has created in access (which the only thing I know about is that you use it to mail merge addresses on form letters). The table has over 250 rows full of information with boxes to the right where you can put a check mark to indicate something or other. This document is at least ten, or fifteen pages long and utterly unintelligible to me. (My results were in two pages in a word doc sayign stuff like: # of Females - 23, # of Males - 18...you know; results? not formless data?) As I stare blankly at the screen wondering how in the world she could have misunderstood our instructions so completely, she goes on to say that she's eliminated the race category as well as ages of people and Paul's table. (Paul is our client who presented us with a table to use during our observation where we code visitor behavior. Like; interacts with exhibit, ignores label = E1. This is the main thing he wanted us to note and my partner has completely eliminated not only the notes I made on MY observations, but the entire category). So I'm staring in shock and she's explaining that she knows this will be useful, but she can't remember how exactly to analyze the stuff now that she's created it. She also tells me that she is going out of town Thursday and won't be back until late Sunday night. Our paper is due next Wednesday. Tuesday I have class until 4 in the afternoon, and I know for a fact that she always takes a "recovery" day when she returns from these trips, which leaves Monday out. So really it seems we have to write the entire paper that afternoon.
I sigh and say we should get started. First we make some graphs. This relatively simple task is stretched out to an hour (for maybe 3 graphs - we need much more than just three) since partner is at the computer, fumbling and using some wierd program that she insists makes graphs better than word or powerpoint which I suggested. The graphs are butt ugly and I know I'm going to have to go back and fix them once she's gone. I say we should ignore the graphs and concentrate on the text. I suggest we split up and I write on my interview results and she write on her observation "results" since I can't read the table she made. She agrees and we go to work. Forty five minutes later she comes over to me and says that she is "dangerously tired" and needs to go. After some very irritating problems with the computer we manage to copy/paste what we've done (I've integrated the graphs, with text explaining them, which took up three pages...she's written three paragraphs). She says that she will type her stuff on the plane tomorrow and email it to me by Friday. I say fine and that I will try and edit it all together and email it back for her perusal. She thinks this is good.
When I get home I look at her stuff. We are supposed to report on whether visitor experience is better with the presence of facilitators or not. My partner had been preoccupied with how facilitators interact with each other, where they come up with lesson plans, their unique "social capital" to the museum and a bunch of other crap that's interesting, but not really the point of the project. So I look at her stuff. Under the title of Observation Notes she was to write under she has put another title; "Facilitators" where she proceeded to write about all the crap I just mentioned. You know the "mildly interesting, if you want to write an academic paper, but of no use to the client who employs the facilitators and should know perfectly well where they get their training."
So I get to work, ignoring this and concentrating on my section. I finish this Thursday and realize that my partner is not to be trusted with the observations. After some internal struggling over the wisdom in trusting her to do it right when she has yet to do so I decide that she will inevitably write the wrong stuff, leave out everything that's important and not get it to me until Monday when there's not much I can do about it. So I trudge up to the school yet again, and upload all of my observations into the program we were supposed to be using all along. I code the data, with Paul's behavior codes, and analyze it. I'm at the school for three hours and don't get home until after nine). Today I am writing up all of the info like I did for the interviews yesterday.
If I get a chance tomorrow I can analyze the data for the other exhibit and hand it all in together...otherwise that will be sometime next week (this isn't due until october, so it's okay)
What this means: I did the interviews (both asked the questions and transcribed the notes correctly), I'm doing the observations, I'm doing the Gyro chair exhibit alone (which was planned), I'm writing the paper, I'm doing the graphs. My partner: found the site, provided the video camera; which btw ate half of the interviews.
So now I'm wondering if I should say something to our advisor. My partner is expecting to graduate from this project, just like me. But it seems that I've done most of the work. Patrick thinks I should tell on her and she shouldn't get credit for my work. I don't want to ruin her chances of graduation, but I do think it's true that she has yet to grasp what it is we are supposed to be doing as anthropologists. She has questioned and then ignored all of the methods of field work and analysis that anthropologists use. Shouldn't she have "mastered" these in order to graduate with a masters degree in anthropology? So I have tons of crap to do. It sucks. Let this be a warning for all of you who think working with a partner on something as important as your masters capstone project is a good idea. It's not. Don't do it. Run the other way!