For Essay #1, you have the option of using real-world interviews with your neighbors, family, and friends or you can use local newspaper articles you find in our databases.
Interviews
Newspaper Articles
The BEST way to find reputable news on neighborhoods like yours is to use one of the Library's newspaper databases, like:
Access to newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and many more.
Access to national and local newspapers.
If you cannot find anything on your specific neighborhood, try broadening the area. If you cannot find “Woodland Hills,” try “Los Angeles.”
Need help identifying a problem? Try these data maps:
○ The website extracts data from the existing records system at each participating law enforcement agency through an automated import process. The data displayed will always be the most current available.
○ Get a rating for local schools on a 1-10 scale
○ CDC data displayed on maps
For Essay #2, you need to investigate the causes of the problem you identified in Essay #1. This means you have to run many different searches using many different combinations of keywords. See the guide below to help.
To start, just try a simple “causes of _________ in __________?” For example:
If you already have an idea about a cause already, search that:
The databases below will help you to find facts, evidence, and data about the causes of your problem.. Be sure to use quotations around concepts that are more than one word, like "climate change."
You can also search across most of our databases at one time using OneSearch.
To access the databases from off campus, you will need to sign in with your Pierce ID number and your 4-digit password (MMDD in birthday format).
You can also use the Library's newspaper databases, like:
Access to newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and many more.
Essay #3 needs an additional 3 database articles. Use any of the ones listed above or any of the 60 other databases from the library.
Government Websites
Government websites at the national and state level generally feature .gov in their web addresses. Local government sites usually have an .org in their web addresses.
Some National Websites
Some State Websites
Some Local Websites
*To find your local city council, Google “city council” followed by the name of your neighborhood. For example, you can find the Woodland Hills City Council here:
For an MLA in-text citation to cite articles on the government website, you will need the title of the article you are quoting from. The works cited page will need the title, the organization, any updated date, and the web address.
Essay #4 will outline the ways you can implement your solution. You can use any of the sources listed above or try these:
You could:
Keywords are the most important words or concepts from our research question plus synonyms (or related words) for each. We need to use these, rather than our longer research question, when searching for books and articles in library databases.
Search using your keywords in One Search, or another library resource, and examine your results. You may find no relevant results, way too many results, results that are not interesting, or results that are just different from what you expected. These are signs that you may want to tweak your research question to find better results. This is normal as few of us rarely start with a topic that works perfectly.
An essential component of any search is using a variety of keywords and phrases to get the most out of your search. For example, if you were searching for articles on litter in Woodland Hills, you might run this search first:
If you didn’t find enough search results, you might try synonyms, more general keywords, more specific keywords, or a combination of those
Using Synonyms
Getting More General
Getting More Specific
Use quotes around words that need to appear next to each other in the results. Use the words “and” “or” or “not” to make your search more accurate.
Fake news is everywhere. You have to be careful.
While the websites of some news outlets are reliable, others -- like Fox or MSNBC -- are not. Some sites traffic in bad information or "fake news" and should be avoided.
When in doubt, use a fact-checking website:
Media Bias is not the same as fake news, but is something you should look out for. This chart can help you see where your news outlet falls on the media bias spectrum:
That said, many websites are reliable while still coming from a particular viewpoint.
If you are looking for reliable, CONSERVATIVE news sources, you may want to look at the following:
If you are looking for reliable, LIBERAL news sources, you may want to look at some of the following: