Policy Proposal Project
Civics & Government |
Civics & Government |
Library Databases |
Explores a single "hot" issue from the news in-depth each week. Topics include social and teen issues, the environment, health, education, science, and technology. Every report is written by an experienced journalist and features comments from experts. Also includes charts, graphs, sidebar articles, a pro-con feature, a chronology, lengthy bibliographies, and a list of contacts. (Full access to all articles published after 2012.)
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Current news, investigations, opinions, photos, and videos by the journalists of The New York Times from more than 150 countries around the world. Access the archive, including primary sources, via the TimesMachine. Sign up for a digital subscription using your school Google login. Watch this video tutorial to help you get started.
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Additional Resources
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Provides neutral and factual information about U.S. government officials, candidates, issues, and elections. Look up political figures' views on key issues and policies, campaign funding sources, voter registration rules, sample ballots for upcoming elections, and more. Whether you're researching for class or want to be an informed voter, Ballotpedia helps you understand American politics at the national, state, and local levels.
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This resource is devoted to making the U.S. Supreme Court accessible to everyone. Find searchable audio of court proceedings, easy to understand case summaries and decision information, and full-text Supreme Court opinions. Oyez also provides detailed information on every Justice throughout the Court’s history and offers a panoramic tour of the Supreme Court building.
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The U.S. Census Bureau provides facts and figures about America’s population, places, and economy. Find detailed data on topics like education levels, income, technology access, religion, race and ethnicity, businesses, and more across the United States. You can find information for specific states, cities, zip codes, congressional districts, and other locations. The Census Bureau's data search tool enables you to enter your desired parameters and then create maps, charts and graphs.
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Prepare the Soil
Background investigation and thoughtful questions lay a healthy groundwork for your research.
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Plant the Seeds
The librarians and databases can help you locate quality sources that will sprout into your research project.
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Harvest your Crop
Use NoodleTools and Google Drive to organize, compile, and annotate the sources and information you have gathered.
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Terms
The actual words you are looking for. PROTIP:
Use quotation marks to search for specific words together in a specific order "Declaration of Independence"
"Civil Rights"
"Chicago Fire" |
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AND
Results with search terms combined.
Lincoln AND "civil rights"
poverty AND crime |
OR
Results with any of the search terms.
"right to vote" OR suffrage
wage OR income (Great for synonyms and ideas with many different names.) |
NOT
Results with search terms excluded.
"Chicago Fire" NOT soccer
dementia NOT Alzheimer's (Great for targeting a term that has many different meanings.) |
Subject
What topics the resource covers Hone in on all of the resources related to a topic. Databases often have specific, controlled vocabulary for topics. "Canines" instead of "dogs"; "hypertension" instead of "high blood pressure." Search multiple subject terms at once using Boolean Operators to get even more specific. You can find a database's specific subject terms linked in a resource's information page, or in a database's Thesaurus Terms. Use those terms to search in the Subject field on future searches. Peer Reviewed — Limits to items from scholarly journals that have gone through a review process by experts in the field. Publication Date
When the resource was created Limit the results to recent years for the most up-to-date information and research. Older results can help find primary sources or show how people in certain time periods understood your topic. |
Source/Content Type
Where the resource was originally published Reference Books of facts with specific entries to cover particular information, like encyclopedias, atlases, dictionaries, etc. (Ex. Dictionary of American History, Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice) Newspaper/Magazine/Periodical Often shorter articles, for the public and a general audience. Great for overviews, recent news, and opinions about a topic. (Ex. Rolling Stone, Chicago Tribune) Academic/Scholarly/Trade Journal More technical articles for a more specialized audience. Often longer articles that include actual studies and research conducted on a particular topic. (Ex. Journal of Education, American Historical Review) Full Text
If the entire resource can be viewed and accessed on the database Some databases just include information and a citation for the resource, but not the actual resource itself. Limiting by "Full Text" excludes those from your search results. If you see a citation for a resource that you would like to find, talk to the librarians. We can often get that resource for you in just a few days! |
Abstracts are short summaries of there resource. Read the abstract and subject terms to decide if you want to save the resource and explore it further. This will save you a lot of time! Use the citations and bibliographies of the most useful resources. Search for those authors, or even those exact resources. Find the information those writers used. |
Search multiple databases. Each database has a different collection of resources. Performing the same search will get you even more resources to choose from. |
How do you know if news and other online information is credible? Use the four moves of the S.I.F.T. method to help you analyze news, videos, and other information that you encounter online and on social media. The SIFT method is a strategy developed by digital literacy expert, Mike Caulfield. All SIFT information on this page is adapted from his materials with a CC BY 4.0 license.
When in doubt, contact an expert - like a librarian!
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Save Resources & Citations |
NoodleTools provides integrated tools for citations, document archiving, annotation, and collaborative research and writing. Most library databases will create properly formatted citations and export it right to your NoodleTools project folder.
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Google Docs has a built-in Citation Tool to help you format citations, create a bibliography/works cited page, add footnotes, and more. Watch a tutorial here.
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The Online Writing Lab (O.W.L) at Purdue University is an extensive resource for creating works cited and annotated bibliographies, as well as help with research, writing, and formatting styles.
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Librarians
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Library Hours Monday - Friday 7:00 a.m. — 4:30 p.m. |