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Methods

Since the study required going out and asking people to participate in a survey the process began with getting permission from the FGCU review board. This was done to protect the people we spoke to from any perceived harm and assured them anonymity. It also let the university know that we would be representing the students during our research. Furthermore, it assured the university that we would be conducting ethical research. Each person was asked to sign a release form stating we had their permission to use the information gathered from the surveys as long as they weren't identified by name. We also gave them a letter explaining the process, our intents, and how the information would be used. We divided the research, interviews, analysis, and writing among the student.

Population and Sample- the desired outcome of the research was to find out what the social affects of the Lake Trafford Restoration would be on the community. We wanted to start by talking to the people who use the lake and to the rest of the Immokalee population. The Immokalee Population is 18,066 out of that 10,692 are Hispanic making them 60% of the total population (US Census 1990). Since they are the majority of the population we needed to include them in our study. One of the students involved in the study is of Hispanic descent and was assigned the duty of translating the survey into Spanish then going out and speaking to the Spanish community. The Hispanic population was difficult to reach due to their level of trust therefore the student had to establish a contact with an individual who was well known and trusted by the Hispanic community. Once the contact was made and the student was introduced the people where very willing to talk to her. Most of the Hispanic population was located in a camp on the south side of town, the rest of the contacts where made in the Immokalee Park. The contact with the Caucasian population was made at the Lake Trafford Marina. The People at the lake were easier to talk to and some were referrals from the Marina Owners. The method we used is known as the "Snowball Sample". This means the sample was found through informal networks and was non random. Since the process was non-random the generalizations made in our study do not apply to the entire Immokalee population, but does serve in making inferences about the people's opinions and actions.

Analysis- the quantitative information collected was put into a spreadsheet in Excel and the qualitative date collected was used for frequency analysis of response using ANTHROPAC. The data was also converted to SPSS for statistical analysis. Each student analyzed the information and presented their findings to the Immokalee community in a power point presentation at the Immokalee Community Center on Tuesday, April 25, 2000.

By: Laura Lopez