Research Assignments

500 words

In a seamless posting, please incorporate the following into your initial posting:

Review recently published (within the past five years) peer-reviewed scholarly articles located in the AMU/APUS University’s online Library databases.  Discuss a criminal justice, intelligence studies, international relations or security management topic requesting instructor approval of the topic you would like for your research proposal (term project) paper. In doing so, please remember for this class you are selecting a topic NOT for writing a research paper about, but rather for writing a proposal to do actual hands-on research using scientific research methodology. In your forum post discuss what you have identified in the current peer reviewed literature located in the APUS Library databases on a topic you wish to research. Briefly discuss the literature and express what still needs to be researched or requires further research on the topic you would like to address in your research proposal. In other words, did the authors of the studies already done on this topic you reviewed call for further research on the topic or something to do with the topic? Then again, perhaps you identified a problem that still needs to be researched on the topic where the current literature is lacking.  If so, discuss what it is and how it pertains to the topic and why it needs to be researched and who would benefit from the research. After doing so, you are to provide a ‘Working Title’ for your Research Proposal, as discussed in this week’s lesson. Understanding this may change as your Research Proposal develops during the course.

Student expectations for Forum questions: 

Your initial Forum posts require a minimum of a 500 word substantive response.

A total of three posting is necessary to have completed the bare minimum amount of forum work each week.

Original responseholarly reference that goes beyond the readings.Students should be using the APUS Online Library to search for peer-reviewed journal articles that help support their argument. The in-text citation and references will be formatted in APA Style. Your original posting should be posted as a response to the Forum question. Please be sure to use your own words; meet the deliverable length; support your main post (in-text citations AND list of references); use paragraphs in your main post to organize your points and make it more reader-friendly; and post three time per week. Please avoid “i” … etc and be sure to start each new sentence with a capital letter.

There is help with proper APA Style formatting in the lessons and resource sections of the electronic classroom, which can be found on the menu bar on the course homepage. Your responses are due no later than Sunday 11:55 PM EST. 
All postings should contribute and advance the class knowledge of the course themes. Students are encouraged to “get out of the comfort zones” when making their arguments. The reason behind this activity allows students to analyze work from many different perspectives allowing the critical thinking process to grow. If you always stay in your comfort zone, you are not accepting of new ideas and concepts. Feel free to explore your theories and test them on the battlefield of peer review. Just make sure to include a scholarly reference to help support your argument.