Private: Overview of Writing Essays
2 Picking a Topic
Picking a Topic
Choosing a topic is an important step in the research process. The rest of your work during the research process is dependent on how well you’ve selected a topic and generated a research question. You may have a wide range of choice in selecting a topic, or you might be required to focus on some very specific topic areas.
What is a Research Question?
The research question represents what you want to know about your topic. Think about what interests you. What do you want to learn about your topic? What do you think other students might want to know more about?
Let’s think about the topic of immigration.
Here’s a possible question you might be interested in learning more about: Why do people immigrate from one region to another?
How will further immigration restrictions impact globalization?
Let’s think about how you might move from a broad topic to a specific research question.
Environment & Climate Change
If you’re interested in exploring issues related to the environment and climate change, you might be thinking about questions like these in the table below.
| Too broad… | Too Narrow… | A Good Start! |
| What is pollution?
What is Climate Change? |
What things do you recycle? | What is the benefit of recycling?
What is forest deforestation, and what is the extent of the problem? Are electric cars good for environment? Is a vegan diet better for the environment? |
Health & Medicine
If you are interested in exploring topics related to health and medicine, you might want to consider the table below.
| Too broad… | Too Narrow… | A Good Start! |
| How has medicine evolved over the years? | How often do you exercise?
Is there a waiting period to sign up for health insurance? |
Can Artificial Intelligence make people healthier?
How can we educate individuals about diabetes? (What are the most effective diabetes education/prevention programs?) Why is health insurance so expensive in the United States; and who benefits from the high cost of health insurance? What are the effects and dangers of consuming Genetically Modified Foods? |
Some Possible Research Issues…
The topics below, food insecurity, COVID-19, and racism in education, are three possible starting points for your own research questions.
Food Insecurity
What can colleges and universities do to help address this issue? How has this issue changed over time? What are some issues from a personal (individual) perspective? What are some issues from a systemic (national) perspective?
- The hidden crisis on college campuses: Many students don’t have
- enough to eat
- Food Insecurity in America Tied to Prices, Poverty
- Hunger & Health’s List of Top 10 research articles on hunger/food insecurity
- The New Face of Hunger
- How financial aid betrays the modern family
- What colleges can do right now to help low-income students succeed
COVID-19
What should college and universities do to adapt to the health and safety concerns of COVID-19? What are the major concerns related to the virus that are impacting college students? What can local and state governments do?
- Universities will never be the same after the coronavirus crisis (Nature, June 1)
- How colleges can keep the coronavirus off campus (commentary, New York Times, June 1)
- Coronavirus: Most disruption for universities since World War II (Government Technology, June 1)
- Lessons for higher education from the CDC and FDA virus-testing fiasco (National Review, May 28)
- A closer look at how colleges can reopoen (Axios, May 26)
- What does COVID-19 mean for the future of college admissions? (video with transcripts, PBS News Hour, May 18)
- It’s not so much when colleges reopen – it’s also how (Inside Higher Ed, May 18)
- College students experience mental health decline from COVID-19 effects, survey finds. Here’s how to get help. (Philadelphia Inquirer, May 14)
- With colleges shuttered, more students consider gap years. But those may be disrupted, too. (Washington Post, May 13)
- How COVID-19 is sparking a revolution in higher education (World Economic Forum, May 12)
- The crisis on campus is here to stay (Bloomberg, May 11)
- Higher ed’s coronavirus opportunity (Wall Street Journal, May 10)
- Higher ed needs a long-term plan for virtual learning (Harvard Business Review, May 5)
- 6 ways college might look different in the fall (NPR, May 5)
- Plans for fall assume professors will be willing to teach. Will they? (Inside Higher Ed, May 4)
- How will colleges recover from coronavirus? Campuses that survived disasters offer clues (NBC News, May 4)
- If colleges can’t welcome students to campus in the fall, some might close for good (NBC Boston, May 4)
- The COVID college experience: Building resilience, finding structure and maintaining connection (Forbes, Apr 30)
Racism in Education
What do we know about the educational experiences and opportunities for different populations of students? What can colleges and universities do to help students from diverse backgrounds succeed?
- List of resources: African-American Experience and Issues of Race and Racism in U.S. Schools
- Video: What can implicit bias teach us about racialized policing? (Dr. Kimberly Kahn)
- Video: Testing privilege: Who believes whom when they talk about racism. (Dr. Keon West)
- Video: Identify, challenge and dismantle: A few sociocultural strategies for teaching about racism. (Dr. Phia Salter)
- Video: African Americans, stress, and trauma in the context of COVID-19 and violent racist acts. (Dr. Riana Anderson)
- Blog post: We are not okay. And you shouldn’t be either. (Graduate student Meg Guliford)
- Op-ed: Of course there are protests. The state is failing black people. (Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor)
- Op-ed: Why white silence is deafening—and deadly (Dr. Sirry Alang)
- Blog post: Where is the outrage for Breonna Taylor? (Graduate student Renee Nishawn Scott)