Freshman Seminar 10/6/10 - Tammy

This week in Freshman Seminar Dr. Williams taught us how to conduct research in order to prepare for our upcoming group presentations. She told us that there are six components in conducting a formal research project. The first step is the statemen tof the problem or challenge in which the researchers narrow down what their research topic is and what challenges are facing their topic.The second step is teh current state of the research. This means that researchers must find out what research is already available about their topic and figure out what new research they need to find out about it. Third is the methodology which includes, how the researches will get information about their topic, what design they will use and what discipline will they focus on. The fourth step is the Framework in which team members discuss how they will present their data and how the project will flow. The members construct the outline of the project and what is necessary in order for the project topic to be presented clearly, efficiently and effectively. This also goes along with the fifth step which is the development of the thesis where group members use the data and relate it to the thesis and then come to a conclusion which is the final step.

I was very surprised that Dr. Williams told us that Howard University was the leader in interdisciplinary research. Of course, Howard is world-renown for its leadership in African-American studies (i.e the African Burial Ground); however, it is good to know that Howard goes beyond just African-American topics. I love the fact that schools that are considered to be better than Howard, look to us on how to conduct proper research on a particular topic. Although, I learned how to conduct a formal research project in high school, Dr. Williams helped clearly defined what it is our group needs to do in order to answer our group project question. Our group will use the process outlined by Dr. Williams and hopefully do a good job in answering how we will use our degrees to help out the community. Too often black people who graduate from college, forget about the community from which they came. Our group wants to be a part of the few people that go back and use what we have learned in college to help out the black community as a whole. Hopefully, next week during our group meetings we will use Dr. Williams's powerpoint to help direct our project.