Good searching can shorten your research time significantly. Here are some tips from the pros:
Use quotation marks around a phrase to inform the search engine to look for exactly the phrase you enter- for example "food desert" or "youth activism".
When searching for a keyword with multiple variations (ex. "education", "educators") use the root form of the word and add an asterisk (*). This means using educat* will retrieve items that have all variations-- "education", "educators", etc.
Be specific: A search for "housing crisis" and eviction* or "rental cost" or "affordable housing" is better than one for "housing issues"
Use the built-in database filters to focus your results- most interfaces let you limit by publication date, subject, format and more
Finally, ZSR Librarians are here to help you find the best sources for your research assignment!
Before getting started with research, it is a good idea to start with some background and context to the issues you are investigating. The sources below will help you get to that information quickly AND they can help you focus your research topic!