This course is intended to give your practice using a variety of the best reference, bibliographic and literature resources that define the "ways of knowing" that constitute what we call the social sciences and their related professional practice areas.

While the topical sessions and exercises I give you on a weekly basis are intended to show you--and then give you practice in--the use of this complex "knowledge apparatus," the evidence that I will get from you that shows your comprehension of this knowledge system is your final project.  Like a course term paper, your final project is the single most important way I have of assessing your understanding of the content and techniques I have exposed you to.

As you now know, each week I offer up an "exercise" for you to complete.  These exercises are only weighed in the sense that they, in total, are worth only 10 to 15 percent of your grade for the course.  It is the final project, completed by each student, that is of paramount importance. 

Final Project

Your personal research project is an opportunity for you to investigate, in a good deal of detail, what scholarly--and otherwise reliable and valid, academic--resources exist for some topic that is part of your professional or disciplinary degree area. Your project is also, by far, the main means of assessing how you did in understanding in the content of the course. It constitutes fully 85 percent of your final course grade.

The semester-length research project is a chance for you to see what exists in both the traditional, print-based resource bases of books, documents, and journals and journal articles, as well as identifying those individuals, organizations and other entities that have to do with the topic you chose to research in the newer online, digital resources of today's information environment.

The document that you build for this project--what we call a "pathfinder"--will demonstrate your mastery over the system of literature and bibliography I expose you to in the topical sessions of the course.  This project will be your evidence of mastery over the searching tools and techniques you learned about in LIS5703, Electronic Access to Social Science Research Resources.

Topical Areas

I will expect the academic or professional topic you choose to be either . . .

1. a topic or sub-area within the discipline or professional area that matches your degree program (degree programs such as Human Relations, Public Administration, Education, Business, International Relations, . . . ) 
   
    or
    
2. a cross-disciplinary or mission-oriented topic that is at least partially associated with the program area of your graduate degree.

I will expect that most of the topics of the projects I approve will be in, or directly related to, one of the social sciences or their related professional areas.

This project is not about producing fancy web documents, although most of the examples I show you will be, conveniently, available for you to see on the Internet.  The prime importance is the content you submit in your project; less important, although not unimportant, is the medium you use to present it.

A web page, with imbedded links to resources, is a very useful way of showing people how they can find something--especially if it is on the Internet!  It would be less helpful to give them a paper document with the links written on it (for them to retype in their browser). However, it is possible and fairly easy to convert a Microsoft Word document into an html page, with links built into it, right there inside of Word's menuing system.  A web document is not what this project is essentially about: it is mostly about effectively relating to an audience an overview of the major access points to knowledge about a particular topic in, or related to, your graduate degree area.

This week I will force you to begin the process of this research project by getting you to specify (and receive my feedback on) the topic of your pathfinder, the document you’ll submit as your final project at the conclusion of this course.

Take some time to review the information on the pathfinder assignment that I’ve posted for you on the LIS 5703 public website ( http://www.ou.edu/ap/lis5703 ).  The information about the pathfinder project and its criteria for evaluation are in the right column of the course page.  Information about grading is in the center column.  Here are the three sections you should reread now, at a minimum:

• Final Project (right column)

Under this link, we describe the pathfinder in depth (along with the annotated bibliography and bibliographic essay, which are a couple of other project formats I will allow you to use but only under particularly compelling circumstances) and provide links to sample pathfinders for your review. 

• Criteria for its Evaluation (right column)

Under this link I describe the information I expect to be included in the pathfinder and provide the criteria I’ll use in grading your pathfinder. 

• Grading (center column)

This link gives you a broad definition of how I define the letter grades I award.

Also, please notice

• the three examples of pathfinders from students several semesters ago, under Pathfinder Template and Examples (right column). 

My goal is to give you the opportunity at regular intervals throughout the remainder of the course to submit draft portions of the pathfinder for feedback. 

Remember that the pathfinder is meant to demonstrate your mastery of the skills and concepts taught in the course.  By the end of the course, then, your pathfinder should be already mostly put together (since you’ve been adding pieces to it all along) and of a quality you’re comfortable with (since I’ve provided feedback to you along the way).

NOTE:  For this first pathfinder project work, submit the following two pieces of information directly to me at  jgoodson@ou.edu

You won’t post this information to a D2L topic area, but will rather send it directly to me by email (this is private information between you and me; it is not meant to be shared with others, so I don't use the D2L messaging areas for the submission of pathfinder information for approval).

1.      Your title for a topic to work on. 

Your topic should be a) some subject or topical sub-area within the discipline or professional area that matches your degree program (Human Relations, Public Administration, Education, Business, International Relations, . . . )  or b) a cross-disciplinary or mission-oriented topic that is at least partially associated with the program area of your graduate degree. This means that I will expect most of the topics of the projects I approve will be in, or directly related to, one of the social sciences or their related professional areas.  This is not an occasion for you to work on a topic that is recreational or a hobby, or about a topic in another non-social science discipline.    The course is about social science research resources, not humanities or sciences, or engineering, or architecture, or . . . .

2.      Preliminary statement of the pathfinder’s scope. 

This is preliminary, and you may add to it or edit it as your pathfinder develops over the next several months.  I am just giving you the opportunity to begin to formulate your pathfinder’s scope and receive feedback from me that you’re on the right track.  See the pathfinder Criteria statement and the sample pathfinders for additional information (Criteria for Pathfinder Evaluation).