The findingDulcinea Blog

SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial

Dulcinea Media Announces Tutorial for Teaching Web Research Skills

June 22, 2011 – New York, NY – Each year, schools in the United States spend literally billions of dollars on Internet access to the more than 15 million computers in schools, nearly 100% of which are now online.  Unfortunately, much of this money is wasted, because not enough time is invested in teaching students and educators how to use the Web to research effectively - a critical skill for 21st century workers.

Study after study conducted over the past decade has shown that most students cannot effectively find information online, evaluate it, and put it to use. Furthermore, recent studies show that many educators, who are overburdened by ever-growing paperwork and standardized testing, have, like most adults, not fully developed their own web research skills. Researchers now warn of a new digital divide, between students who do receive effective web research training and those who do not.

To help educators counter this new digital divide, Dulcinea Media, Inc. today announced the SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial, a research-based, multimedia tutorial that teaches effective web research skills to both educators and students.

Please view our video explaining the SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial.

Alternatively, view our SlideShare presentation, without the voiceover.

Lastly, click here to preview the educator version of the tutorial.

The company plans to release several versions of the Tutorial:

• For K-12 educators, titled “Web Research Skills for Educators;”
• for students in Grades K-6, titled “How to Be a Rock Star Researcher;”
• for students in Grades 7-12 and college, titled “Stop Searching, Start Finding: Get Better Results in Half the Time;” and
• versions of the above titles for Spanish-speakers 

The planned full release schedule is as follows:

• the educator version will be available in early December 2011;
• the version for older students will be released in early December 2011;
• the version for younger students and the Spanish language version will be released in January 2012.

The Company will also release additional information about the Web Research Tutorial, in accordance with the above schedule, through its blog.

Composition of Tutorial: 

The SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial is published as an electronic video book, with 16 chapters. Each chapter offers an introduction, a 3 to 5-minute video, a print guide to the topic, links to expertly curated third-party resources, and a self-quiz to help the viewer evaluate retention of the core concepts in the chapter. Each chapter builds upon, and reinforces concepts taught in the previous chapter. The company is also creating posters, glossaries and other visual elements to aid learning.

Chapter titles include:

• Planning and Adjusting Your Research;
• Using Special Search Functions;
• Finding and Using Primary Sources;
• Why Did the Author Write This;
•  Thinking Critically; and
• Synthesizing Your Sources

The content engages the reader and respect the way people learn best today. Unlike many professional  development systems that involve a lengthy, one-time presentation with little follow-up, Dulcinea Media’s tutorial offers a self-directed program of video tutorials, with several types of supporting materials and frequent follow-ups.

Dulcinea Media will update the Tutorial twice a year to incorporate new developments in web research and to leverage new learning tools.

Summary of Research Basis for Tutorial:

A 2006 report by the Educational Testing Service found, “students can use technology for socializing or entertainment but still have problems finding information, evaluating it and then putting it to use.”[1] Authors of a 2010 Northwestern study of college students reported that “students’ level of faith in their search engine of choice is so high that they do not feel the need to verify for themselves who authored the pages they view or what their qualifications might be.” [2]

Many other studies have similarly concluded that students do not know how to search the Web effectively, and struggle to synthesize multiple resources. Furthermore, no consensus has emerged on how to teach students Web research skills. [3]

The Web Research Tutorial is based on: (i) a thorough analysis of research studies of the habits of both skilled and inexperienced web users [4]; (ii) input from leading educators; and (iii) the research habits of the staff members of findingDulcinea, who have collectively written thousands of articles that effectively synthesize the best online resources about a topic.

Pricing: 

The annual license cost per school for the Web Research Tutorial, based on total student population:

 

Student pop.	Annual Pricing
1-249	$719
250-499	$919
500-749	$1099
750-999	$1269
1,000+	$1399

 

All versions will be made available to all scholls purchasing the tutorial.

Pricing does not include the option for an in-person or virtual presentation by a Dulcinea Media staff member or consultant, for which an additional fee, and reasonable travel expenses will apply.

The license term is for one year and may be renewed annually.

Schools may acquire a permanent license with a one-time payment equal to 4x the annual fee.

Dulcinea Media will update the Tutorial twice a year to incorporate new developments in web research and to leverage new learning tools.

“Early Adopter” Incentive:

As an early ordering incentive, schools that pay for the tutorial within 30 days of its full release will receive a 50% discount, for the initial one-year term and up to two renewal terms.

Schools that order and pay for the tutorial between 31 and 60 days following its full release will be offered at a 25% discount for the initial one-year term and up to two renewal terms.

Standards Alignment:

The SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial aligns to the Core Common State Standards for English and Language Arts. In particular, it addresses the standards relating to:

• conducting research projects based on focused questions;
• tailoring searches online to acquire useful information efficiently;
• gathering relevant information from multiple print and digital sources;
• assessing the credibility and accuracy of each source; and
• integrating the information while avoiding plagiarism. 

The Tutorial also aligns to standards set by ISTE, the ALA, and NCTE/IRA.

Delivery of Tutorial:

The e-book will be web-based, accessed through password protected accounts. In coming months, it will also be made available as an app on the iPad, iPhone and Android phones.

Ordering Information:

Please email info@DulcineaMedia.com or call (917) 597-3815 to discuss ordering the SweetSearch Web Research Tutorial.

_______________________________

[1] Paul D. Thacker, “Are College Students Techno Idiots?” Inside Higher Ed, November 15, 2006 http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/15/infolit

[2] Debra Viadero, “Collecting Evidence,” EdWeek, March 29, 2007 http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/03/29/30tcresearch.h26.html

[3] Eszter Hargittai, Lindsay Fullerton, Ericka Menchen-Trevino and Kristin Yates Thomas, Northwestern University, “Trust Online: Young Adults’ Evaluation of Web Content,” International Journal of Communication 4 (2010), 468–494 1932–8036/20100468 http://ijoc.org/ojs/index.php/ijoc/article/view/636

[4] Anne Aula, Rehan Khan and Zhiwei Guan, “How does Search Behavior Change as Search Becomes More Difficult?” Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2010 http://dub.washington.edu/pubs/215

 

The Dirty Little Secrets of Search Skills of the Lost Generation

The New York Times Website reported today on "The Dirty Little Secrets of Search." It details how J.C. Penney manipulated Google’s search results to rank first for search terms such as ”dresses” and “bedding.” The article follows another NY Times article, "A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web,” which described how a crooked retailer’s Website ranked high in Google for "eyeglasses," because of links from highly critical Web postings.

In today’s article, Matt Cutts of Google defended his team’s efforts to combat search engine spam, noting that “[s]pammers never stop.” The article offers data that explains spammers’ persistence: on average, 34 percent of Google’s traffic goes to the No. 1 result, about twice what goes to No. 2 result.

Google cannot reasonably be expected to anticipate or immediately counter every scheme. The solution to this problem is not to shame Google into working harder to fight spam. The solution is education. Internet users must learn how to find information online effectively, so they are not as heavily influenced by the first search results on a single search engine. Unfortunately, study after study shows that the vast majority of Internet users, including college and high school students, cannot effectively use the Internet to find, evaluate and use the information they need in their daily lives. This is a much more profound problem than whose Website shows up first for "dresses" or "eyeglasses."

A 2008 survey commissioned by Yahoo! found that 85% of initial search queries fail to return the information users were seeking. A 2008 research review by the University College of London exposed as a myth the notion of a “Google Generation” of young people with native ability to find information online. In 2010, we conducted our own study of 300 high school and middle school students. When we asked how they knew if a site was credible, the most common answers were "if it sounds good" or "if it has the information I need." Two-thirds of students said they “rarely” or “never” check the author or date of an article, with some adding that “it doesn’t matter who wrote it” and “you can never find the date.”

An article in Inside HigherEd last fall laid bare how dismal the research habits of college students are. The article reported on a presentation by Andrew Asher, who had studied the search habits of more than 600 Illinois college students, nearly all of whom reported relying heavily on the first few results on Google for their research. He quoted a sophomore biology major: “I’m just trusting Google to know what are the good resources.” And yet Asher reported that “of all the students that I interviewed, not a single one of them could give an adequate conceptual definition of how Google returns results...The word 'magic' came up a lot."

Asher’s findings sync with the conclusions of the 2008 University College of London research review. It reported a "new divide," finding students who had access to effective research training from librarians in high school "taking the prize of better grades," with those who didn’t have such access showing up at college "beyond hope," having "already developed an ingrained coping behaviour: they have learned to 'get by' with Google."

That many college students are “beyond hope” was echoed by three college librarians in the Inside Higher Ed article. A Seton Hall librarian told Inside Higher Ed that "unless we can demonstrate some measurable payoff to searching, students aren’t going to do it."

How much does the unwillingness of students to learn research skills contribute to what experts call a “lost generation” of chronically unemployed, or under-employed, workers, resulting from a mismatch of workers' skills and employers' needs? Would you pay someone to do "research" for you that consisted of summarizing the first links on Google? Or would you instead hire one of the few people on the other side of the "new divide," who knows how to find the best information available anywhere?

Will this "lost generation" phenomenon continue with current students? Our experience suggests that, for many, it will. Dulcinea Media is continuing to develop SweetSearch and our other tools and content that help educators teach students how to use the Internet effectively. While reviews of our products are almost unanimously glowing and their use is growing nicely, a barrier to their wide adoption by schools is the status quo - textbooks and other crude tools from the 19th century that remain the primary method by which students learn.

We realize that most classroom teachers generally lack the time and experience required to teach intensive online research skills, and thus school librarians play a critical role in preparing students to succeed in the current marketplace. Yet around the world, many school librarian positions are coming under the axe as school boards begin to consider next year's budgets.

Conversely, we've come across hundreds of schools with very strong library programs that anchor a true 21st century curriculum that teaches students the skills they'll need to succeed in the workforce. We're encouraged that our presentation on teaching Web research skills has been downloaded 21,000 times in four months, and is being taught as part of the curriculum at colleges of education and library science. Students who learn these skills will become the eventual political and business leaders of our world; students who don't will continue to get tripped up by scammers who finagle a high position in Google's search results.

Mark Moran

CEO

 

 

Why SweetSearch Is the Best Search Engine for Students

SweetSearch is the product of 100,000+ hours of research that went into creating findingDulcinea's 700+ Web Guides and thousands of articles. This content links to tens of thousands of Web sites that have been evaluated as credible by our research experts and librarian and teacher consultants.

SweetSearch searches a "whitelist" comprised only of these 35,000 links, as well as sites we uncover by sifting through recommendations of librarians and teachers on their blogs and social bookmarking sites. You know those great lists you've been bookmarking for years? Well, SweetSearch is a giant, searchable repository of them.

It's likely that, had we sat down at the beginning to find a list of 35,000 credible sites, we would not have done it nearly as well as we did by instead finding, evaluating, organizing and annotating hundreds of Web Guides to the best 25-75 sites about a particular subject, or the best 5-8 sources about thousands of events in history, famous people, or timeless news topics.

We constantly evaluate the search results in SweetSearch and "fine-tune" them, by increasing the ranking of Web sites from organizations such as the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian, PBS and universities. We do more than merely exclude spam sites; we also exclude marginal sites that read well and authoritatively, but lack academic or journalistic rigor, and thus are not cite worthy.

For a bevy of reviews of findingDulcinea and SweetSearch from top educators, see our media kit; to add SweetSearch to the search options on your Web browsers, click on the "Add On" box on SweetSearch; or get a widget for SweetSearch, to  embed it on your school Web site.

For younger learners, we've recently introduced a beta version of SweetSearch4Me, which is the only search engine that prominently ranks high quality Websites created for elementary school students, and mixes them with accessible primary source sites.

(Please note that SweetSearch4Me is the only variant search engine; our landing pages for School Librarians, Social Studies Teachers, Biographies, etc. do not contain their own versions of SweetSearch; they all highlight particular content from findingDulcinea and other sites that are useful to the target group, but the search engine included is the original version of SweetSearch).

Technology journalist Paul Gilster wrote in his column in The News Observer, "Search here and you're working in a universe of checked, verifiable sources and solid information.....Google or Bing may find many of the same sites, but what I've noticed is that some of the better sites for a particular topic wind up deep in their search results, often outranked by Web pages more commonly used but of inferior quality...I was impressed with SweetSearch's focus on credible scholarship and emphasis on primary source materials."

Our favorite review came from an impressive member of our target audience - Amanda, who blogs as "Farmgirl Writes," and deemed SweetSearch "an amazing search engine," and explained,

"Within a half-an-hour, I was ready to type my essay, wondering why I'd wasted a half a day searching with Google and EBSCOhost. (Sorry Google. I still love you - just not for research anymore.) Why didn't I discover this before? If I had known about Sweet Search at the beginning of World History, I think I would have saved myself hundreds of hours of research."

Many articles that may be 3, 5, or 10 years old - but are still the most authoritative writing on the subject - are treated as stale by other search engines, and yet appear on the first page of SweetSearch results.  And to most students, the first page is the only one that exists. 

 The result? As Amanda wrote, students find what they need, and they find it faster. When my generation was in school, the librarian pointed us to pre-screened resources on our general subject, and we decided which ones were the most relevant to our specific research project. That’s what SweetSearch does for students with online resources. 

To enable students to better scan results to determine relevancy, we've partnered with Yolink. From a SweetSearch results page, click on the Yolink toolbar on the left side, and add a term to narrow your search. Yolink will then browse your original search results and show an expanded view of the results in which your additional term appears. Yolink then enables you to save excerpts of search results, with the source link, to a Google doc, Web-based email, or social bookmarking and sharing services such as Diigo, and to the citation generator Easy Bib.

Together, SweetSearch, Yolink and EasyBib are utterly transforming Web search for students, from something they can barely use to something they can use quite effectively.

 Of course, students still need to follow the principles laid out in our Ten Steps to Better Web Research by, among other things, formulating good search queries, and often looking past the first few results to find the very best ones. Another principle is to use more than one search engine, as not even we use SweetSearch exclusively - when we research an article, we start with SweetSearch and usually find substantially all we need there, but then we always cross-check against other search engines and databases, and so should your students. To facilitate this, SweetSearch includes a toggle option to view the search results from Google. 

But enough of the "press release."  Let's take SweetSearch for a test-drive. We'll compare the results for "War of 1812" on SweetSearch, Google and Bing.

Many of the results returned by Google and Bing aren't quite up to snuff for including in a school paper. Wikipedia ranks first on both engines. While many people find Wikipedia a good place to begin their research, most educators are frustrated that students use it almost exclusively, and not wisely.  For this reason, Wikipedia almost never shows up in SweetSearch results.

For "War of 1812," the second result on Google is "Gateway New Orleans," which includes a brief summary of the war by an unknown author. The purpose of the site is to promote tourism in New Orleans, not to promote scholarship on the War of 1812. And both search engines prominently display a link that contains a teaser summary of the war by Gala Films, whose purpose is to get you to buy a movie.

Both of these sites rank so high because general commercial search engines display recently published content high in its results, since many times that is what the user finds most relevant. But when it comes to a war that ended nearly two centuries ago, recently produced material has little advantage over the “classics.” 

Both search engines also prominently feature "Warof1812.ca," and "Warof1812.net," likely because of the specificity of their domain names. The first offers a lot of material written by two people, whose credentials are not provided. The site contains no "About Us" section, and its primary purpose is to sell products relating to the war. The second is the result of a long-abandoned project to put student material on the Internet; it's primary purpose now seems to be to drive you to search the topic yourself on Google.

On the first page of SweetSearch's results, you'll find precisely the Web sites that a teacher wants students using. The first result is the Library of Congress' entire collection of primary source documents on the War of 1812. The second is a comprehensive ThinkQuest created by students under the supervision of teachers and professors, followed by sites from the National Archives and the U.S. Military.  Four sites in the next group—an Indiana University site about the political cartoons of the War of 1812, a Long Island University site about African-American Freedom Fighters, a Smithsonian site about the Star Spangled Banner, and the Avalon Project of Yale University—are sites that students could use to solidly distinguish their work from that of their classmates. Where are these results on Google and Bing? Scattered through the third to seventh results pages.

Now let's do a comparison for "Shakespeare" in SweetSearch, Google and Bing.

Again, Wikipedia ranks first for Google and Bing. Also appearing prominently, again due to the specific domain names, are "Shakespeare.com" and "Shakespeare-online.com." Each of these is a well-written "passion site," one created by an individual who is passionate about the subject, but does not possess academic credentials that would enable a student to rely on the sites when writing an academic paper. Each engine also contains several sites that are only about selling products.

On SweetSearch, you again find some outstanding academic resources, many of which are buried in Google or Bing. These include sites from the Library of Congress, the British Library, PBS and Project Gutenberg.

We'd love to get your feedback on SweetSearch. Try your own searches and let us know what you think by commenting below or by e-mailing us at Mark[dot]Moran[at]DulcineaMedia[dot]com

Mark Moran
Founder and CEO

 

I've Graduated from College. Now What?

Over dinner a few weeks ago, I listened to a group of my closest friends lamenting the economic crisis and the death grip it held on their efforts to find jobs. One friend pointed out that I was unusually calm, despite the fact that I had hardly started my job search and that those companies to which I had applied had turned me down. She suggested that I, with my optimistic temperament, write an article for findingDulcinea about how frenzied graduates should relax and try to have fun looking for jobs in today’s economy.

Weeks later, after a particularly painful evening of scouring idealist.org only to conclude that I am probably not skilled enough to even manage a hot dog cart, I came into work discouraged and exhausted. The Editor-in-Chief asked how things were going, and I confessed that the job search was taking its toll. When she suggested the same thing my friend had—that I write a graduates’ job search guide—I was stunned. Who am I to tell my peers how to find a job? I haven’t even found one for myself yet! I’ve lost all focus of what I want to do after graduation and have experienced only failure in my search efforts so far. But she insisted that I AM an expert, because I am in the thick of it, or as she put, “in the forest” (implying that the job search is a dark, wooded area … fair enough).

Writing this three-part series (see links at bottom of article) has turned out to be the most useful thing I have done to advance my personal career search, far exceeding the seminars I’ve attended and the hours I’ve wasted aimlessly browsing my university’s job postings online. I learned about job search Web sites that I never knew existed, many through findingDulcinea’s existing career Web guides. I took a personality quiz (to ensure that the Web site’s evaluation tools were reliable, obviously) and found that I might be well-suited to a career in advertising, teaching or consulting. I hit the jackpot when I found a series of videos hosted by Pricewaterhouse Coopers; every tip was a new gem that I have since incorporated into my search tactics.

Anyone who knows me can tell you that I’m pretty biased when it comes to going overseas. In my opinion, any experience in a foreign culture will make you a more interesting, well-rounded, thoughtful, understanding, independent and expressive person. In my research for the third part of my series, “Work, Intern or Volunteer Abroad,” I learned about dozens of language immersion opportunities in other countries and have since decided to move to Costa Rica for several weeks this summer to learn Spanish.

So thank you, findingDulcinea, for helping me with my own job search. Hopefully the features I wrote will help other recent graduates get on the right track or, at the very least, will inspire them to form a more positive attitude about the process.

Erin Harris

UPDATE:

Erin wrote this blog post in May 2009.  A year later, she is working as a research assistant in the Genetics Department at Children's Hospital Boston. She's taking classes at night to prepare for a program in physical therapy, an area that she has gotten interested in since starting her job at the hospital.

As for the job search itself, it wasn't an easy, but Erin offers some tips that worked best for her:

1. Don't underestimate paper: Sure, maybe its more convenient to apply for jobs via your iPhone, but sending an application in the mail can make a huge impression. I would suggest still sending an electronic version as many employers require it, but those applications often get routed to a large pool of applicants, which I call the nebula, because once your name goes in, it often disappears forever. Take a few minutes to look up the name of an HR representative, and send a hard copy of your application directly to that person. Oftentimes, the rep will get back in touch with you or will forward your information on to the appropriate hiring manager.

2. Talk: Introduce yourself to someone who works at a company you are interested in and ask them if they would be willing to have an informational interview with you. This is a chance for you to ask questions about the person's day-to-day job, the company atmosphere, how awesome the holiday party is, etc. without the pressure or a formal suit-and-tie, sweaty-hands interview. I asked several people, from study abroad counselors to marketing associates to an English professor, out for coffee to learn more about what they do and not once did I get rejected. People love talking about themselves and this can be a great way to get your foot in the door.

3. Network: Yes it is awkward, but it can be fun and turn out some great connections if you step outside of your box. I showed up to an alumni networking event in Boston, and tried to balance eating mammoth-sized pieces of sushi with presenting myself as a mature, appealing job candidate (the oversized finger foods were intentional in my opinion...a challenge set forth by the NYU event planners who stood by and chuckled as we introduced ourselves to CEO's with half-eaten chicken skewers in our hands). Somehow, I walked out with 10 business cards and a job offer at a consulting firm in downtown Boston.

and finally...

4. Stay positive: It will happen. As long as you are trying, you will get a job.

Good luck!

Read the three articles in Erin's series:

The Post-Graduation Job Search: Find You Fit

The Post-Graduation Job Search: Taking Action

The Post-Graduation Job Search: Work, Travel or Volunteer Abroad

The Importance of Great Teachers

Over the past year, FindingDulcinea has spotlighted several amazing educators, such as Alan Haskvitz, an American teacher who has taught nearly every grade level and core subject over the past 20 years, and written books and articles about education. Our Educator Profiles on the findingEducation Digital Teachers' Lounge are further proof that there are countless educators driven to make a real difference in their students' lives.

Recently, we published an article about students in rural districts and whether they get a fair shot at top tier colleges and universities. In addition to discovering eye-opening information about the challenges faced by students outside of cities and wealthier suburbs—fewer mentors who've attended Ivy League schools, for example—the article introduced us to an amazing woman named Angela Bakker-Lee, a native of the rural town of LaCenter, Wash.

Bakker-Lee granted findingDulcinea an interview in which she discussed the positive influences she was lucky enough to have while growing up. Teachers like Linda Lee Tatro helped Bakker-Lee discover that there was a big world outside of her hometown.

"I have no doubt that knowing her changed my life. She encouraged me in a way that no other teacher had up to that point. She had more confidence in me than I did. And I think she was the first adult to really talk to me," Bakker-Lee explained.

After attending Stanford University and being awarded a Marshall Scholarship, which allowed her to study in Europe, Bakker-Lee settled in New York, where she works in management consulting. Although she’s clearly a naturally driven person, Bakker-Lee credits her teachers in LaCenter for their encouragement and belief in her when she started applying to highly competitive schools.

“Two of my favorite teachers were exceptionally supportive and excited for me: Sharon Bryan (English) and Joanne Bevans (Biology/Chemistry). They encouraged me to do it, and never seemed to have any doubts that I would make it to my goal. That meant a lot to me, knowing that they believed in me,” Bakker-Lee says.

Of course, getting into college is just the first step. Even after they've graduated, students can always use an extra confidence boost, especially knowing they're up against a shaky economy. May is almost here, and you'll find tips for what to give new grads in our feature on Finding the Perfect Gift for Your College Graduate.

Sarah Amandolare

Senior Writer

Question Number Two: Why Did They Write This?

Once you know who published the Web site and wrote the content, you have to ask, "Why?"

When we create our Web Guides, we usually provide research strategies that caution you to be wary of sites that aren't what they seem. We've come across dozens of Web sites that appear to offer valid information but in fact were created for another purpose. 

Some of these we explained in a feature called "Suspicious Sites," that is an ideal tool for learning how to decipher "why" a site was created. 

Many Web sites provide so-called information about a health topic, but are published by lawyers looking for medical malpractice clients. 

We've uncovered Web sites that appear on the surface to provide good information about 

• mortgages, 
• financial advice, 
• insurance, 
• plastic surgery options and 
• drug treatment centers.

But in each case, their only purpose was to collect your personal information so they could sell it to companies or individuals offering those services. 

In a more common example, we recently wrote about a famous woman whose achievements were legitimately disputed. The Maryland Women's Hall of Fame site offered a biography about her but didn't mention the controversy. The stated purpose of the site was to honor women who have made lasting contributions, and apparently it felt that its mission would be compromised if it diluted her contribution by noting the controversy. Yet if you handed in a paper on this woman and did not note the controversy, the omission would probably reduce your grade.

In all these cases, publishing accurate, balanced information was not the primary purpose of the Web site.

Of course, you should use a full list of criteria when evaluating a Web site. But as soon as a Web site loads on your computer, ask yourself "who," and then "why"?

Then comes when.

Question Number Three: When Did They Write This?

Thank you for reading,

Mark E. Moran

CEO

Question Number One: Who Wrote This?

Finding information on the Internet is like being a good police detective: the information is only as good as its source. And, like a good detective, a good Web researcher never decides to use information without considering who gave it to him. He asks, “Who created this Web site, and who is the author of the content I'm reading?”

Now, this may seem obvious, but when we asked 300 students how they know they can trust information on a Web site, very few of them said they look at the site's publisher and its authors. And I've even way too many adults recommend a Web site even though the site itself offered no information about who created it.

Is the site's publisher a scientific journal, a law firm, a university or a well-established news organization? Are the writers professors, journalists or experts in the field?

Does the site employ a whole editorial team, with full-time writers and skilled editors who review everything, or are the publisher and writer the same person—someone with a lot of knowledge about, and passion for, the topic? If the latter, is he just publishing the site as a hobby? If so, the consequences for getting information wrong are minimal.

Is the author simply trying to entertain you, or sell you something, or get you to donate money to a cause?

Who cares? Google sorts this all out for you, and lists the sites from the best writers first, right?

Wrong.

In fact, the opposite is usually true.

Someone who wants to sell you something works hard to make his site rank higher than it should. And someone who is passionate about a topic and unburdened by journalistic or academic guidelines may write an entertaining article that is linked to often and thus ranks well in search engines.

On the other hand, many experts and professors don't even try to make their Web sites rank high in search engines.

When I explained why SweetSearch was the best search engine for students, I showed several examples of the biggest search engines giving prominence to sites that didn't say who they were published by or who authored their articles.

So how do you find out who published the site and why?

The “About Us” section of a site is a good place to start. If the site doesn't list the name of the publisher and its management team—and this is often the case—then hit your “back” button and visit another site. You would never trust a book without knowing its author and publisher; why would you trust a Web site without the same information?

But the “About Us” can't be the end of your research. Look for additional information about the publisher or author and their credentials elsewhere on the Web site, and then by searching their names in a search engine. Any reputable publisher or author should be mentioned on other reputable Web sites. For an author, search the name along with key subject words to see if he or she has written other articles on the subject for other publications. Usually someone who is an expert on a topic writes about it often for several different publications.

Now that you know how to find out who wrote this, also ask:

Question Number Two: Why Did They Write This?

Question Number Three: When Did They Write This?

Mark E. Moran

Founder & CEO

The two most important questions to ask when evaluating a Web site

Many students evaluate Web sites using a long list of criteria, but pay little heed to the most important two:

Who publishes this Web site and wrote its content, and why?

When we asked 300 high school and middle school students how they know they can trust information on a Web site, few mentioned evaluating the site's publisher and its authors. Further, I've seen hundreds of cases where intelligent professionals have recommend, or cited, a Web site without knowing who published its content. When I evaluate a Web site, "who" and "why" are the first questions I ask, and it often only takes me a few seconds to decide to move on to the next Web site.

The publisher and its authors may be scientists, doctors, lawyers, or professors seeking to enhance professional reputations. Or it may be a news organization staffed by people with years of journalism education and training, with strong editorial guidelines, and a veteran editing team. The site may be published by an intelligent person who has a lot of knowledge about, and passion for, the topic, but who is publishing the site as a hobby, and doesn't necessarily care if he gets it exactly right.  It may have been written by someone who is merely looking to entertain you.  Or sell you something, or get you to donate money to a cause.

I've listed these types of possible authors in order of credibility. You might think that this also reflects their ranking in major search engines. In fact, the opposite is usually true. Someone looking to sell you something devotes a lot of resources to manipulating search engines so his site ranks higher than it should. And someone who is passionate about a topic and not burdened by journalistic or academic guidelines may write an entertaining site that is linked to often, and thus ranks well in search engines. Conversely, professional and academic experts usually put no effort into making their Web sites rank well in search engines.

When I explained why SweetSearch was the best search engine for students, I compared its search results for "War of 1812" and "Shakespeare" to those of Google and Bing. Those search engines prominently listed sites because that were recently published, and whose purpose was to get you to visit a city or watch a movie. Others were trying to sell you products, or were written by people whose credentials were little more than "I really love Shakespeare." Do you want to trust your grade to information found on any of these sites?

So how do you find out who published the site, and why?

The “About Us” section of a site is a good place to start. If the site doesn't list the name of the publisher and its management team - and this is often the case - then hit your Back button and visit another site. You would never trust a book without knowing its author and publisher; why would you trust a Web site without the same information?

But the About Us can't be the end of your research. Look for additional information about the publisher or author, and their intentions, elsewhere on the Web site, and then by searching the names in a search engine. Any reputable publisher or author should be mentioned on other reputable Web sites. For an author, search the name along with key subject words to see if he or she has written other articles, for other publications, on the subject. Usually someone who is an expert on a topic writes about it often, for several different publications.

Once you know who published the Web site and wrote the content, you have to ask, "Why?"

When we create our Web Guides for findingDulcinea, we usually provide research strategies that caution you to be wary of sites that aren't what they seem. We've come across dozens of Web sites that appear to offer valid information but in fact were created for another purpose. Some of these we explained in a feature called "Suspicious Sites," that is an ideal tool for learning how to decipher "why" a site was created. Many Web sites provide so-called information about a health topic, but were published by lawyers looking for medical malpractice clients. We've uncovered Web sites that appear on the surface to provide good information about mortgages, financial advice, insurance, plastic surgery options or drug treatment centers, but their only purpose was to collect your personal information so they could sell it to companies or individuals offering those services. In a more common example, recently we wrote about a highly celebrated woman who achievements were the subject of a good faith, historic dispute; we noted that a government-funded "Hall of Fame" site failed to even mention the controversy. The stated purpose of the site was to honor woman who have made lasting contributions, and apparently it felt that this mission would be compromised by reporting the controversy.

In all these cases, publishing accurate, balanced information was not the primary purpose of the Web site.

Of course, you should use a full list of criteria when evaluating a Web site. But as soon as a Web site loads on your computer, ask yourself "who" and "why"?

Mark Moran

Founder & CEO

The Internet Holds the Past, Too

Modern-day students live in a ‘now’ society, but now is constantly shifting. What’s ‘now’ right now—Kanye West’s rude interruption of country crossover Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards—has already begun sliding into the archives of our minds. It will appear in media outlets for days to come, and will be revived on end-of-year lists recapping the wackiest moments in pop culture, but it’s already passé to a lot of people, particularly young people.

A week is a long time in politics. It’s also a long time in a student’s life. My tenth grade history teacher once wisely told our Western Civ class, “Every year of your life will feel shorter.” Ten years later, I see he was right. For today’s students, the media—and particularly the Internet—is helping to stretch time even more. The number of events, exchanges, videos and emoticons that a young person experiences in a given week is far greater than it was for me ten years ago. But each digital transaction seems to hinge on the present, or better yet, the future. What about the past?

Beloit College publishes the Mindset List every fall. It’s an “effort to identify the worldview of 18 year-olds” entering their first year of college. The list is made up of cultural phenomena that have existed during these students’ lifetimes. For example, the class of 2013 has “never used a card catalog to find a book.”

As Time Magazine rightly notes in an article on the list, a lot has changed since 1991, the year most of this year’s college freshmen were born. “In 1991 the world watched a black motorist named Rodney King be beaten by L.A. cops, all of whom were acquitted; a majority of whites still disapproved of interracial marriage. Ask yourself, Would the people we were then have voted for a mixed-race President and a black First Lady?”

We can look back, and pat ourselves on the back for how far we’ve come. But to keep moving forward, we have to keep looking back—not only at last week, when outbursts by Rep. Joe Wilson, Serena Williams and Kanye West got us thinking about topics like race, sportsmanship, egotism, manners and musical talent—but farther back, decades and even centuries back.

The Internet has a reputation for showcasing the next big thing in an ever-refreshing browser page. But today’s young thinkers should remember that the Internet is a limitless store of information, and it has a very good memory.

Check out our article “Web Sites for Researching History” to delve deeper into the past online.

Stay tuned for our On This Day Challenge, launching next week, where students will improve their online research skills and general Web savvy by writing articles about historical events using online resources. Students will post their articles to findingEducation, our collaboration tool for teachers and students, and we'll be selecting the best for publication on findingDulcinea.

Sign up for findingEducation to get notified about the challenge launch!

Live Blogging Beyond Facebook: How Will Today's Students Use the Web of Tomorrow? | Internet Week NY 2009

Students are at the forefront of a rapidly changing Internet, which is posing significant questions for how universities, Web businesses and employers will adjust. To explore this further, findingDulcinea is hosting and moderating a panel of leading student-focused startups who will discuss how students will find the best information online, how they're tailoring the Web in unique ways to fit their varied interests, how new Web sites will fulfill students’ needs, and ways in which businesses can better serve the 16-22 age group. We’ll also ask for audience participation as we share goals and forecasts for the Internet of the next five years. Our panelists are:

• Ariel Aberg-Riger, Creative Development & Marketing Manager, Fourth Story Media
• Jordan Goldman, Founder and CEO, Unigo
• Kate Hillis, Co-Founder & Partner, NextNext Entertainment, Chat the Planet and Qwidget
• Mark Moran, Founder & CEO, findingDulcinea and SweetSearch, Moderator
• James Rohrbach, Founder & CEO, GulliverGo
• Michael Staton, Founder & CEO, Inigral

Follow the event here, or on our Twitter account. Follow the discussion using the Twitter hashtag #gmfb.