Final Selection

After narrowing all of the topics down, I decided to research gangs. I think that this topic will keep me entertained for the six months that we have to follow it. It's one of those things that you never know what's going to come of it, so it's always exciting to hear what's going on. I can always research back in a time a little and see what types of things have happened with gangs in the past, as well as how much they have changed over time. I thought that if I researched serial killers, then it would potentially get boring after a while with no new information coming in. Then if I researched underage drinking, I felt as if I would get the same information over and over again. I could still get information about recent accidents which could be interesting, I just don't think I could be interested in it for the six months. I overall think that gangs is a good choice for me because I think some of the things that they do is really cool, and I would be able to get a lot of info.

There definitely is enough happening right now with gangs for me to have updated information. Gangs are apart of the whole world, so even if there isn't much going on in the United States, there might me something interesting happening in Mexico or the Dominican Republic. I decided that I won't necessarily be exclusive with the Bloods and the Crips, but also look at the other types of gangs in general. When I looked them up on the Internet, there were a lot of recent stories about gangs and accidents with them. There were stories about murders, assaults, and court summonses. There was a lot of information that I found and it was all easy to access. There was a lot of information in google news and a few in some newspaper websites as well. Believe it or not, there are gangs everywhere and things going on that you never would have guessed.

The topic of gangs is a very good candidate for ongoing research. Everyday there is something new going on with them like I said. It's such a broad topic. There are tons and tons of gangs throughout the US and the world so finding information daily shouldn't be a problem. Just because the police and school headmasters are trying to limit gang activity and get rid of it all, doesn't mean that they are going away any time soon. Time will definitely make a different with the research. Hopefully there will be changes in what's happening over time so that could be really helpful with my research. I also think that with the economy, there will be more gang activity then before. People are losing money, so I think that crime rates and drug dealing will be increasing.

I think that the topic of gangs will stretch my brain a little bit. I don't understand them completely and why they do the things they do, so that's one way that I can think outside the box. One thing that I think is really cool will be trying to spot out gang members. After learning about them I think it would be sick to be able to see a gang member in action. I want to go to a high school around the Portland area to interview a principal to see what they have to say about their gangs. I might gain a new perspective about gangsters.

Some Ideas...

Underage drinking doesn't seem like a bad topic to me. I can see how this would be a very relevant topic for our age group in Maine, compared to the other topics. We know underaged drinking goes on with teenagers that go to Lincoln Academy and sometimes there are tragic consequences when these students start driving.
I think the topic of serial killers could be very interesting if you focus on the psychology of the killers. You could try to determine whether genetics are a factor or if the motives are entirely generated by past experiences. It would be interesting to find out if it is possible to find pathological signs in the person's behavior before its too late.
The topic of "Gangs: Bloods and Crips?" is a good choice because of the ammount of recent, relevant information. I am curious to whether "crips" has any relation to "crypts" like the tombs where they put dead bodies. Overall, I think this your most dynamic topic with new information posted frequently.

Gangs...

I think this is a very interesting topic to research. Along with the questions that you want to anwser, you might want to research how gangs have changed over the years. This would be interesting to know because it would show how they change with different generations and how current events effect what they do. It will be very interesting to read what types of things you find!

interesting

It's too bad you couldn't find more information on serial killers- that would have been fascinating- especially with all the psychology that is involved. I like your choice of topics. They're not anything that I would immediately think of researching, but now that you've brought them up they seem very interesting. What are the Bloods and Crips? I'm really not up on my gangs knowledge. I bet you could get lots information if you were able to contact an inner-city social worker somewhere, and newpaper articles would be good for very current happenings. Also, it would be good to explore the positive sides of gangs, if there are any. Comradery? Are there "do good" gangs that help others? Or is that just another name for a volunteer organization? I can't wait to hear more!

Comments from Everett

It is knd of unclear what you want to learn about the bloods and the Crips. In your first paragraph, I think that redundant is the wrong word to be used in that instace. In paragraph 2 you say, "I personally would like to find out about the Bloods and Crips and just be able to follow them specifically and find out what’s going on with them" someone of average knowledge of gangs may not realize exactly "whats going on with them". Main question: What interests you most about gangs?"

It appears that your mind is made up on what you will be writing about for the next few months, an I look forward to be reading about the topic in the future...

EM

Hmmm My Three Topics

Isearch Topics

The three topics that I have chosen to research are gangs, serial killers, and underage drinking. With gangs, I want to look at the Bloods and the Crips, with serial killer, what’s happening with them right now and how they are being followed, and underage drinking and if the drinking age should be lowered or not. I thought doing gangs would be really interesting and same with serial killers, yet underage drinking is fairly redundant topic. We have to find a topic that interests us, and I don’t want to get bored with what I have to research.

When I looked up gangs I actually find quite a bit, and I was honestly surprised by it. I found up to date articles about things that are going on ever day with them. I personally would like to find out about the Bloods and Crips and just be able to follow them specifically and find out what’s going on with them. Between the Marvel database and Google News, there were many articles from today and this week about recent activities involving gangs. I’m interested in the Bloods and Gangs because I think it will be easier where they are the most common gangs that people have heard of, and that exist. The articles that I found were just about the gangs and what they are, they were about what types of things have happened such as convictions, murders, assaults, and other gang related activity.

Serial killers are a fairly hard topic to look up. There are a quite a few articles about them, but nothing is extremely recent. Not much happens during the event of hunting a serial killer down. It’s not something where you can just get information frequently you have to wait for a break through. I don’t feel like researching this topic would provide me with as much information that I need to keep my search going for six months. There also isn’t much action going on right now with serial killers. Most of them are in the past like Jeffrey Dahmar and Ted Bundy. They are previous killers and right now there isn’t anything going on like that. This will limit my search and would make it really hard.

The last topic that I was considering is underage drinking. The question is whether or not the legal drinking age should be lowered. I personally don’t think it should be, and I want to research all the different aspects of teenagers drinking. I would look at incidents and events that have happened to help prove my point, or possibly persuade me in the other direction. I found a bunch of articles on newspaper sites and Google news about teenagers getting drunk and being murdered, or found dead in swamps, or going to jail. This topic is redundant though. We hear constantly about not drinking although a mass majority does it. It honestly can be an annoying topic, and it gets old after awhile.

After looking up all three topics, I have decided that I want to research gangs. I think that following what is going on with the Bloods and Crips and even what’s going on between them would be really cool. I also like the idea of researching them, because around here we don’t have a whole bunch of that going on. We don’t have to worry about gang activity in our school, so we don’t necessarily know all that much about it.