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183 Appendix A Methods This study employed ethnographic methods to provide a naturalistic account of the staff’s decision-making process in the juvenile drug court. By “naturalistic ” I mean that I attempted to obtain an understanding of the local meanings about youth drug use, youth noncompliance, and staff work practices . I paid particular attention to how staff articulated those meanings to each other in the court, as well as to me in our informal conversations and interviews. My fieldnotes attempted to document the decision-making process as it unfolded, without any editing based on analytical presuppositions or hypotheses. To facilitate this, I strove in my fieldnotes to record “thick descriptions” (Geertz 1973) and used a grounded theory approach (Charmaz 2001; Glaser and Strauss 1967) to analyze my fieldnotes. That is, I began to notice specific areas (e.g., varying uses of drug test results, seemingly inconsistent staff responses to different youths, and staff disagreements about youth actions) that appeared relevant to my study. At that point, I then sought negative cases to enhance my initial understanding of the phenomena. I used that expanded paradigm to inform my interviews with staff, youth, and parents to further supplement my courtroom observations. What follows is a more detailed account of the methods used in the study during the two fieldwork periods in 2003–2004 and 2007. Start, Stop, Start I obtained access to the field site through contacts made at a previous field site. The same organization provided treatment services for the juvenile drug court. I initially started fieldwork in the beginning of September 2003. However , on my first day of fieldwork, the treatment provider—through whom I had access—found out it had just lost its contract with the county to provide services to the court. I pulled out of the field for a month while the treatment agency considered its options. After it appealed the county’s decision and was given an extension through December 2003, I restarted fieldwork in October. When the county denied the organization’s appeal, I got approval from the new treatment provider for my project. The new provider allowed me to continue the project and did not require any changes to the research design. I completed the first fieldwork phase in October 2004. Once in the field, I had almost complete access to the staff and youth participants during the drug court days. In addition to the precourt team meetings and court hearings, I was allowed to observe the screening meetings , in which staff reviewed prospective youth clients, and policy-related meetings regarding drug testing and general operations. I also received the weekly summary report that outlined the youth’s sober day count, program phase, and, in some reports, a brief description of the youth’s progress that week. Finally, I had more limited access to the treatment programs, observing a few programs with staff and youth client approval. I did not have official access to the schools but was able to see many of the clients during my ride-alongs with the field-based staff. I also did not have access to the youths’ official court files during the first fieldwork period, nor was I allowed into the juvenile hall facility to see the youths when they were locked up. Toward the end of the first fieldwork period, I did go on a public tour of juvenile hall and the girls’ probation 120-day program (both located next to the main juvenile court) during an annual open house for the community. I also visited the probation camp facility, located about an hour from the main juvenile court, which housed the 28-day and 120-day drug treatment programs for boys. Being Everywhere and Nowhere: Breadth versus Depth Initially, I envisioned playing a neutral role in the first fieldwork period, focusing equally on the youths, their parents, and staff. However, that did not happen, as the youths and families saw me as staff. This identification largely resulted from my focus on the staff’s team meetings. While I tried to sit apart from staff, various probation officers, police officers, or drug counselors sat next to me in the audience to observe the court hearing. I also had difficulty in balancing my time and attention between the staff and youths. For example, every week I had to decide whether to stay in team meetings before the court hearings or hang out in the waiting area with youths and families. While I knew I could collect detailed...

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