The notion of "the school" as a set of institutional processes and practices that shape the possibilities of educational research forms the focus of this article. It is argued that the discursive and material practices that render schools agencies of cultural reproduction also have effects for what research can be undertaken in them and how. With reference to a series of "episodes" that occurred during research about young people and sexuality in New Zealand, evidence for how schools shape research endeavours is provided. These examples present a complex picture of the way in which schools simultaneously police and are regulated by symbolic boundaries of gender and sexuality. How school disciplinary power works to effect what it is possible to claim about the voluntary nature of student research participation is also explored. It is argued that through the powerful discursive and material practices that occur in schools, these institutions can impede research that attempts to transgress dominant meanings about gender and sexuality.