DR. LEVINE: We may have some trickle in but in the interests of time I will start. It really is a pleasure to be able to introduce and moderate the second session on Social Science Perspectives on Multiple Methods Approaches.

I am Felice Levine, Executive Director of the American Educational Research association and like my colleagues on the Planning Committee for this forum I really want to thank all of you for attending.

As Marty indicated in introducing this forum the outpouring of interest in the event in and of itself I think is an indicator of the high level of engagement and interest both in rigorous science on education and in a deeper and more penetrating consideration of the use of multiple methods.

This particular session is near and dear to my heart. First and foremost we have two exceptional scholars at my far left presenting their ideas on multiple methods. Both are known for their breadth of scholarship, their expertise in methods, the standards of research that they bring to their own work, and their breadth and openness as intellects.

This session is particularly important because it aims to further the discussion begun in the opening session by taking a realistic look at multiple methods as a strategy of inquiry across domains of social problems and processes.

The planning group included this session in the forum as a transition for examining specific examples in the breakout sessions to put the use of multiple methods in a broader context of how social science multiple methods are amenable to examining a range of social problems, institutions, and processes in aspects of education outside often of the school and the formal classroom curriculum as well as of course outside settings well beyond the institution of education.

The goal of this session is to further concretize their use. Our speakers will examine when and how multiple methods can be used effectively, explore when they are most workable and when not, and address what we might learn from their effective use. In a way this will continue really into the breakouts as well as this session.

Also the goal of this session is to transcend the sense that education research is in any sense idiosyncratic. The challenges that we in education face are no different in conceptualization or methodology than those that confront scientists examining other behavioral and social phenomena in areas like mental health or crime and criminal justice.

The second goal is to move us beyond thinking that multiple-methods a theme we have already engaged in perhaps not unexpectedly-is only divisible into quantitative and qualitative approaches, but, as we have already discussed, to see how different strategies of inquiry can be used effectively at and across multiple levels of analysis.

We will move to our speakers and I will introduce them rather quickly. There is the biographical sketch. I thought of how we would sequence and order. So, I thought of my own experimental background and training and thought we would randomize our speakers to control for both recency and primacy effects. Of course, we have too small a sample for both. So, I am really going to be challenged in analyzing the impact of this session, but Tom Cook will speak first in the order I think in the program. He is the Joan and Serepta Harrison Professor of Ethics and Justice at Northwestern University where he is also professor not only of multiple methods but multiple disciplines of sociology, psychology, education and social policy but also a fellow at the Institute for Social Policy.

Receiving his PhD from Stanford University in 1967, he is also well known and highly regarded not only for his work on community health and adolescent development but also his methodological expertise and I emphasize high quality mentoring in methodological issues.

His books in this area include Quasi-Experimental Design and Analysis Issues for Field Settings and Quantitative and Qualitative Methods in Evaluation Research.

Second in this randomized sequence is Richard Murnane, professor of economics at the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University, a Yale-trained economist at the intersection of education and the economy. He has focused specifically on labor force issues and teacher and labor markets and what achievement and skills mean in the context of changes in the US economy.

Dick is currently Chair of the Board of the National Research Council's Center for Education-which is one of our cohosts today and planners of this event-and serves on the board of DBASSE, the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education of the National Research Council, which of course has been central to the social and behavioral sciences and the advancement of our field.

In a career of high scientific productivity Dick also has done his homework. Three years teaching mathematics in a high school is enough to earn your union card and has continued from my recollections of his early work in testifying in the area of school finance to frequently being called upon by teachers and principals as advisers to school systems.

So, we will start with Tom and Dick and then we will turn it over to the Harry's to ask questions.