Skip to Main Content
Skip to content

Skill Builder: Home

15-minutes spent practicing with these newsy topics and authoritative databases will be sure to hone your research skills.

Brainfood

Brainfood

What's next?

What topic is most important to you?
Hate Crimes: 10 votes (83.33%)
Food Insecurity: 2 votes (16.67%)
Total Votes: 12

Labor Unions and Bargaining Rights

Focus: From the history of the labor movement to 21st Century Wisconsin public employee protests

Sexual assault: call it what it is...criminal

Focus: Sexual Assault and Public Policy

There Be Pirates!: piracy past and present

Focus:  Contrasting methods of reporting news of Piracy from 1790 to present day.  See the movie trailer for "Captain Phillips", the dramatization of ship capture and hostage taking by Somali pirates in 2009.

Protest Movements

Focus: Time Magazine's 2011 Person of the Year: The Protester and past American protest movements.

Marriage Equity

Focus: Major legal issues surrounding same-sex marriage, domestic partners, and civil unions.

Several Shades of Gray: A Different Kind of Research

Focus: Somewhere between an idea and a polished publication is the gray area of "science right now" reports.  Explore the sources of Gray Literature and bump up your expectations of research sources.

Make Joseph Kony Famous

Focus: Lords Resistance Army and Joseph Kony

Famine in Historic Context

Focus: Locating primary documents that report on famine, food security, and humanitarian aid.  No snacks will be provided for this workshop.

Teatotalers and Bootleggers: the 100 year path to the 18th/21st Amendments

Focus: Primary resources documenting the Temperance Movement, the passage of Prohibition and its repeal.

Looking for Lucretia, Elizabeth, and Susan B.

Focus: Searching for women who put the "Rage" in suffrage!

Underage Drinking

Focus: 1) Iowa City 21-only ordinance 2) underage drinking on campuses nationwide

The Life and Times of Khaddafi

Focus: Foreign media coverage of Libyan leader, Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi, for past and present events.

Environmental Tragedies: Human-Made Disasters

Focus: Find investigative reports and news accounts of events in the aftermath of human-made disasters. The list is long, but here are a few:

  • Dust Bowl (1930-40)
  • Love Canal (1978)
  • Bhopal Gas Leak (1984)
  • Exxon Valdez (1989)

Ask a Librarian

Profile Photo
Brett Cloyd
Contact:
Main Library
319.335.5743
Website

How to Cite