Researching your case for the final arguments

BACKGROUND RESEARCH

Before you can begin to collect useful information, you have to know what you are talking about. The purpose of background research is to learn enough to ask good questions and understand some of the answers. You'll want to know:

• How did the controversy start?
• What people or organizations are involved?
• What is being proposed--what exactly are the plans?
• What are the major issues being debated?
• What do the technical terms or concepts mean?

• Wikipedia
• Lexis-Nexis: News (only available through ISU)
• Des Moines Register
• Ames Tribune

Now that you know who-what-when-where, you can begin to see what arguments people have been using in the controversy. This should get you thinking about what you want to say. So now you need to look for opinionated sources.

This is where the World Wide Web comes in useful--people with strong opinions are willing to share them for free. Start with a google search and try to find some important groups arguing both pro and con on your issue.

Also check these websites that cover all sides of some contemporary controversies:

• Congressional Quaarterly Researcher
• ProCon.org

It probably won't be a good idea to rely on the advocacy groups youjust found during the debate--they will be highly biased, and your adversaries in the debate will easily refute them (and you'll get negative feedback from me as well). So now that you have a general idea of what you're going to be arguing, you need to find strong (expert, unbiased, well-informed, guaranteed) sources to back you up.

For this I recommend a standard academic database (available through ISU), like

• Expanded Academic ASAP
• Academic OneFile

There are also many useful specialized databases, such as:

• Lexis-Nexis Statistical
• ERIC (information about education)
• NSCEP (environmental information)

• Take a sheet of paper and list some key terms on your topic to search. As you find good sources in your research, read them to find more search terms and add them to your list.
• Take another sheet of paper. Every time you do a search, write it down. Write down the date you searched, the database, the search terms, and any "limits" you put on to narrow the search.
• When you search, used the "advanced search" function first to search narrowly (limited time, limited sources). Only do broad searches if narrow searches don't turn up much.
• When you find a source, immediately write down the Author, Title, Source and Date. Same warning as before: or else!

  Good luck, start early, and have fun!