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Assignment 4

Evaluate Transnational Crime Web Sites

Last revised 05/02/2007

Due Date: Bi-Weekly Assignment on Friday and Tuesday nights in weeks 4 through 6.

Purpose:

To critically evaluate the information provided on transnational crime Web sites. Students will apply the skills learned in this course to compare journalistic, scholarly, criminal justice organization, and citizen Web sites.

Directions:

First pick a transnational crime topic or type you want to research and post it to the Week 4 discussion forum. It could be a different topic from the news story topic you are covering for Assignment One. Try to choose a topic, not already chosen by another student. Visit selected transnational crime Web sites (not news or magazine story sites) starting with the course’s built-in transnational crime link megasites within Campus/Blackboard under External Links button (and other links you find as a result of your own explorations), and post comments about the pages to the discussion forum sections (marked as Assignment 2: Transnational Crime Web Sites. The post will include an annotation (see below) of what is available at the visited site, and an opinion of the overall usefulness of the site that follow-up student visitors can use as a guide.

Example of megalinks site: United Nations Crime and Justice Information Network.
http://www.odccp.org/

In assignment one, you tracked news media stories. For this assignment, visit nonjournalistic Web sites that discuss transnational crimes. Examples include scholarly materials (e.g., journals, online books), government reports, or United Nations documents. You can also visit personal Web cites, but watch out for the lunatic factor. You are free to change the category of crime you are researching after a few weeks, or if you think you've exhausted a category.

After visiting a Web site, do two things:

(Step 1) Post the URL and the name of the Web site you visited.

(Note: copying and pasting is the best way to enter the URL into the discussion forum post. Least chance of creating a "bad link." Check the link yourself to make sure what you have posted actually leads back to the page you want it to.) 

(Step 2) Second, write an overview of what is available at the Web site (an annotation). Include the following information: 

  1. What types of sources for information are relied upon?

  2. What sources of information appear to be missing?

  3. How does this compare to what you are finding out about this type of crime from your reading of other sources (newspaper and journalistic sources, textbooks, journals, etc.)?

  4. Does the site author(s) appear to be biased?

  5. Rate the site. Use the categories (1) very useful (2) somewhat useful (3) not very useful.

By Friday and Tuesday nights each week post to the discussion forum within Blackboard the annotation of one Web site, not yet reviewed by another student, that you have visited. This will allow other students to follow your trail. If you are the second, third, fourth, etc., student to visit the site, please add another comment about the site.

(Step 3) Visit three sites per week of those posted by other students. After visiting each of those sites, and reading the original student's annotation, post a short follow-up message in the discussion forum section indicating whether you would also rate the site as (1) very useful (2) somewhat useful (3) not very useful. If you would give the site a different rating, please indicate. Explain your reasoning.

Main posts are due by Fridays and Tuesdays, response posts by Sunday and Thursday nights.


  

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This page was last modified September 07, 2006
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