230.109 Hot Topics in Education

This guide is intended for students in Freshman Seminar: Hot Topics in Education.  Students with additional questions should feel free to contact Ellen Keith, Librarian for Sociology.

Please note that the database links and many other links in this guide will require you to set up remote access if you are connecting from off-campus.  You do not need to do anything if you are using a computer on campus.

Searching Newspapers, Magazines, and Journals

Although both newspapers and magazines often have their own homepages (e.g., The Baltimore Sun and Time Magazine), these sites aren't the first place to go for library research for the following reasons: 1) You often have to pay for older (archived) content; 2) You may not be able to search a range of years or have the most recent results of your search come first in your results list; and 3) You may not have a lot of flexibility in your searching.

The library subscribes to a number of databases that allow you to 1) get content of newspapers and magazines for free; 2) search a range of years and organize your results so that you see the most recent first; and 3) have a lot of flexibility in your searches, selecting to search by a particular subject or journal or date or all three.

Where and How to Search

You can go from the general to the specific--it all depends on the topic that you are searching. Please see the list below for suggested databases.

Newspapers:  great for current events, snapshots of what is going on in certain parts of the country.

LexisNexis Academic New Interface  (All US JHU)

Baltimore Sun (1990- )  (All US JHU)

New York Times (Current)  (All US JHU)

Magazines:  also great for current events.

Academic Search Premier  (All US JHU)

Scholarly Journals in Education and Sociology:  articles in these journals take longer to prepare and be published so are more of a "look back" on what has happened, not as timely as magazines or newspapers but full of analysis.

ERIC (Education Resources Information Center)  (All US JHU)

Sociological Abstracts  (All US JHU)

WilsonWeb  (All US JHU)

Searching Tips

Most database search screens start at the Advanced Search, which means you can do boolean searches ("and," "or," and "not") connecting two or more concepts together.  The Advanced Search also allows you to select Search Fields like Author, Title, Subject, Journal or Magazine Name, etc., that help you refine your search.

Question too many or too few results.  If you retrieve too many hits to reasonably go through, limit your search by adding another term to be more specific or changing your search from a keyword to a subject search, also making it more specific.  If you get too few hits, find a synonym for the term you're using or remove a term from your boolean search.  And, at any point in the research process, consult with me for assistance.

Urban Education Subject Guide

Urban Education
A very helpful guide compiled by a faculty member in the School of Education with additional resources from the librarian for Education.

No Child Left Behind

No Child Left Behind
A Department of Education initiative.