Research Description:

My name is Linda V. Chappeto and I was one of the University Scholars from the Department of political Science. This summer I did research on the Christian Coalition's voter mobilization techniques in the Central Florida Area.

My first step was going to the Institutional Review Board to get my project approved. I am doing elite interviews, which deal with human subjects, and so I had to be officially approved so to judge the ethical nature of my project.

In the meantime, I read various research article on the subject and came up with a list of 20 quality questions to ask at these interviews. I also did a search within the orlando Sentinel for articles pertaining to the Christian Coalition of Florida and their actions both in and out of the election season. I really got a sense of the literature on this topic, both
scholarly and otherwise.

My first interview, of hopefully a total of about 20, took place on August 10, 1999. It was with a senior member of the Christian Coalition of Florida. It will be very advantageous for me to compare the responses of this CCFL official to the scholarly assumptions made by various researchers. I am in the process of scheduling appointments with legislators and church leaders in the Central Florida area to get a different perspective on the actions of the Coalition. I also plan on meeting with a reporter for the Orlando Sentinel who covers matters of religion and politics to get a media person's perspective.

I am continuing to read the literature on this subject that has been published or presented at conferences. I will have a literature review done by the end of this semester, and I hope to have all the remaining interviews done by February. Then I will write and rewrite to finally have a finished product to present in April.