RESEARCH
EDUCATION
IN
Sarah Cohn
Reference & Instruction Librarian
The City College of New York, CUNY
January 3, 2026
AGENDA
Framing our practice
Types of sources
Evaluating information
Keywords & search strategies
Suggested resources
Getting help
TODAY'S
PRACTICE
FRAMING OUR
Searching as Strategic Exploration
Searching for information is often nonlinear and iterative.
It requires you to the evaluate of a range of information or sources, with the flexibility of mind to pursue alternate avenues as new understanding develops.
LLMs & Generative AI
Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT are text-prediction apps.
LLMs do not search the web.
They generate 'answers' based off of their training data.
They will give you fake sources.
LLMs & Generative AI
SOURCES
TYPES OF
Scholarly
- Non-profit & government reports
- Data
- Specialized knowledge
Popular
Gray Literature
- Newspapers and magazines
- Written by journalists
- For everyone
- Current info on the topic
- Academic, Scholarly, Peer Reviewed journal articles
- Written by academics/researchers
- For other academics/researchers
- Original research, theories, findings
- Deep knowledge of the topic
INFORMATION
EVALUATING
What makes a source reliable or credible?
When you're researching, how do you decide if what you're reading/watching is trustworthy?
TERMS
SEARCH
AKA KEYWORDS
what is your main topic?
what are the specifics?
what are different ways to describe your ideas?
what do you want to know?
How does gender impact the achievement gap in New York City?
Gender
- Girls
- Boys
- Non binary
- Transgender
Achievement Gap
- Academic performance
- Students
- Teachers
Impact
- Grades
- Graduation rates
- Retention
- Punishment
New York City
- United States
- Urban
Other Related Ideas
- School policy
- Private school
- Public school
STRATEGIES
SEARCH
Full Sentence Searches
How does gender impact the achievement gap in New York City?
use AND to connect terms
achievement gap AND new york AND gender
disparity AND academic performance AND gender AND new york
combining different terms = different results
RESOURCES
SUGGESTED
-
ERIC
- Education Resources Information Center, sponsored by the US Department of Education. At eric.ed.gov
-
Google Scholar
- Search for scholarly literature. You will not always be able to access the full text of articles.
-
Google Books
- Full-text digitized books
-
HathiTrust
- A partnership of academic & research institutions, offering a collection of millions of titles digitized from libraries around the world.
Open Web Resources
Use your public library card to find books and access databases, either from home or from a library location.
Public Library Resources
- New York Public Library
- Brooklyn Public Library
- Queens Public Library
HELP
GETTING
Sarah Cohn
Reference & Instruction Librarian
scohn@ccny.cuny.edu
SOURCES
CITING YOUR
what is the purpose of citation?
-
Engage in scholarly conversation
-
Relate your own ideas and analysis to existing scholarship
-
Give credit to authors whose ideas you use
-
Allow your reader to find the original article
LO Research in Education 2026
By Sarah Cohn
LO Research in Education 2026
LO January 2026
