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TC 302: Prof. Walker - Housing

Find Information to Support your Recommendations

Scholarly Sources are Good Evidence

Scholarly sources (peer-reviewed journal articles, books, conference proceedings, etc.) serve as good evidence for proposals and arguments in higher education. Use these sources to find analysis and expert information about affordable housing, approaches to housing in higher ed, and more. 

How and Where to Find Scholarly Sources

Library search box - searches across many, but not all, library resources. Great for finding information from a variety of disciplines in one search.

Tips:

  • Use advanced search techniques
  • try different keywords to hone in on your topic.  After you search, you can use the menu on the left side to narrow to peer-reviewed articles, by source type and by year.
  • Try this sample advanced search that uses a variety of keywords.
    • universit* AND (gentrification OR displacement)
    • use AND to require words to appear in search results and OR to require one of the words
    • In this example, multiple searches are simultaneously carried out that must include university or universities and one of the words from within the parentheses

Google Scholar - uses Google to search across scholarly sources. Use it through this guide or the library website in order to be passed through to library subscriptions instead of hitting a paywall.

Library databases (maybe you used Gale or Ebsco databases in hgh school?) let you search for information in a specific discipline. These are useful for diving deeper and doing more precise searching than you can often do in tools that search a broader swath of information.

Useful datatabases for this topic include:

Peer Review in 3 Minutes

From the NCSU Libraries

How can I tell if it's peer-reviewed?

Many library databases will let you limit to scholarly/peer-reviewed articles.  This is a great first step but you still need to check if its peer-reviewed yourself.  Try one of these ways:

1. Google the journal title and read about the journal's process for accepting and publishing work.  It should mention peer review, not just review by an editor.

2. Look up the journal title in a library database called UlrichsWeb.  If it is peer-reviewed (refereed), there will be a little referee shirt there - 

ulrichsweb referee symbol

Find Examples of and Opinions about Housing across Higher Ed in New Sources

Where is the article?

If you don’t see a .pdf of the article you want, click Find it at UT to find it in another database or in print in the Libraries.

If it is only in print in the Libraries or we don’t own the article, click Get a Scan to have the article emailed to you.

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