Should The Internet Be Trusted?
The Internet has become more and more of a favorite place for students to go when searching for sources to use in research papers. This is mostly because of the wide and relatively simple access that the Internet provides to all kinds of information. Why get up and travel all the way to the library when it is so much easier to open a browser window and head to Google? While the Internet can be a wonderful source, and is definitely a fairly new, unique, and versatile way of sharing information, not everything one finds on the free area of the Internet can be trusted. Literally anyone with an Internet connection can put up a webpage in a matter of minutes that would be capable of fooling the unwary Internet surfer. It is crucial when looking for valid sources on the free Internet to look carefully for the purpose of the page, the author(s) of the page, and the institution that backs or produces the page, if any.
One quick way to check the purpose of a webpage is to look for any obvious ads. A webpage that is obviously trying to sell you something is not as likely to be a scholarly webpage. Runway.net has a multitude of ads right on its front page (Cousins homepage). Its purpose is clearly at least partially to sell you something, in this particular case the services of the webmasters in the area of web design. “Linguistic Diversity on the Internet” simply has functional menus leading to the information being presented (Jones homepage). There are no ads and not even any bright, flashy graphics. This article heads straight for the information in a professional manner, lending it a more scholarly feel. While prominently featured ads on a webpage do not necessarily mean that the webpage is a bad source, it should certainly be a cause for a deeper look into the merits of the page.
Another good way to determine if a webpage is a useful source is to investigate the author or authors of the page. If no information at all is listed for the author, the page is useless because its authenticity can not be verified. The authors of Runway.net give no convincing credentials of any kind (Cousins About Us). While they do list their names, contacts, and some information about their background, there is no way to confirm that any of this information is true.
Bentley, Jerry H., and Herbert F. Ziegler. Traditions & Encounters: A Global Perspective on the past. Boston: McGraw Hill, 2000. Print.
Bruccoli, Matthew J. "A Brief Life of Fitzgerald." Biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald. The F. Scott
-“F. Scott Fitzgerald” Bio.True Story. 2013. A & E Networks. Web. 2 Feb 2014. http://www.biography.com/people/f-scott-fitzgerald-9296261
"Child Passenger Safety: Fact Sheet." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 05 Feb. 2014. Web. 05 May 2014.
In 1896, F. Scott Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota on September twenty-fourth. Fitzgerald was named after the author of the “Star Spangled Banner” (LitFinder). He was the only child of Edward and Mollie McQuillan Fitzgerald, and he is Irish by ancestry(McMahon 89). According to Matthew Bruccoli, while Edward was a provincial aristocrat, his mother Mollie, was a “straight 1850 potato –famine Irish” (Bruccoli). Fitzgerald ended up moving to New Jersey in 1911 to obtain an education at Newman College Preparatory School. Two years later he transferred to Princeton University. After schooling, Fitzgerald became a Lieutenant in the U.S. Army, but he never saw war. Instead of entering line of duty in WWI, he was assigned to stay at camp Sheridan. It was at this camp where he met his wife Zelda (LitFinder). While she and Fitzgerald were engaged, he tried to succeed in the advertisement business; however, Zelda, unwilling to wait for him to succeed, broke off the engagement (Bruccoli). Then in 1919 he published, This side of Paradise. This novel allowed Fitzgerald to become a well known literary figure. One year later he married Z...
During the Roaring Twenties, women changed their actions. The 1920s was an explosion of color and a period of escapism. The young women began to set themselves free. The changing role of women was a result from all the work they did during World War I. The younger generation rejected values and customs of their parents’ generation. The young women no longer wanted to be the guardians of morality, dressing in a modest way and refraining from drinking, dancing, and smoking. They wanted to have the freedom to wear short skirts and ride in cars with their boyfriends. Because of all the deaths of World War I, the new generation felt the need to live freely and enjoy life. Young women and men who returned from the war experienced cultures with different customs and standards.
McMahon, Thomas. "F. Scott Fitzgerald." Authors & Artists for Young Adults. Michigan: Gale Research, 1998. N. pag. Print.
Academic integrity has been put in place to protect the ideas of which those belong to. A code between students and faculty has been created to support this policy. When developing a research paper there are a certain number of sources required to support or create an argument in regards to the subject of an assignment. These sources can include many types of media such as articles or documents found on the internet, magazines, books, interviews, or video evidence. A student can chose to exhaust any or all the before mentioned sources; however, they must paraphrase or correctly cite the source to keep in place the standard of originality. “The advance in technology has created additional resources wher...
There are five different criteria that should always be met when it comes to evaluating a website. These criteria’s include accuracy, authority, objectivity, currency, and coverage (“Criteria Used in Evaluating Web Resources”, 2014). Accuracy is deciphering who is hosting the website, if the website has stated the purpose and audience, and if the information on the site is reliable. A good way to check if the information can be trusted is to compare the facts found on the website with other information and facts found from other internet or print sources. Authority is verifying that the author of the website is real, because if the author is real then the information can usually be trusted as well (“Criteria Used in Evaluating Web Resources”, 2014). To check the authority of a site, the page should be examined for information about the author, note if anyone else has contributed to the website, check for contact information, and see if the author has created other websites with factual information. It is a good sign if there is contact information for the author, because it means someone is taking credit for the information on the page (“Criteria Used in Evaluating Web Resources”, 2014). If someone is taking credit, there is a better chance that the information can be trusted because the author would not want a bad reputation and to be held accountable for sharing false information. The objectivity of a website is deciding if the website is trying to sway the reader’s opinion, and if it is biased. If the advertisements on the site are being supplied by the author of the site, then there is a good chance the page is biased. There should be no bias or opinion located on a site that is supposed to supply factual information (“Criter...
Metzger, M. J. (2010). Making sense of credibility on the web: Models for evaluating online information and recommendations for future research. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(13), 2078-2091. doi:10.1002/asi.20672
Aristotle. On Rhetoric. The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present. 2nd ed. Ed. Trans. Patricia Bizzell & Bruce Herzberg. New York: Bedford/St. Martins, 2001. Book I, Chapter V. Print.
How does dropping out of high school affects students’ lives in the future? Students’ dropping out has become a crisis, President Obama said, “It’s time for all of us to come together parents and students, principals, and teachers, business leaders and elected officials to end America’s dropout crisis” (“ President Obama”). There are 7 thousand students’ that drop out of high school that adds up to about 1.2 million each year, wouldn’t it be nice to drop that number and help kids stay in school instead of dropping out of high school(“ President Obama”). Students’ shouldn’t drop out of high school because they couldn’t go to college, couldn’t hold down a job, and would struggle making minimum wage for the rest of their life.
Every 26 seconds one of our kids drops out of high school, that's 1.3 million students each year. The main reason for dropping out, the failure to succeed. Society puts an insurmountable amount of pressure on these kids to succeed, however this can actually be extremely detrimental to the students and children.
Between 3.5 million and 6 million young people in America dropout of high school (Bloom). About 1 million students do not make their way to graduation (Koenig). Dropping out of high school will inhibit any students ability to go onto college. Studies show that if a student were to drop out of high school, the crime rate will be higher(Kokemuller). According to professional statistics, in 2010, the percentage of high school dropouts was at a high of seven percent (Henry). At age sixteen, if a student were to drop out of high school, this student would need a parent to sign for them, and there are many parents who also believe children need an education. In 2006, about sixty-seven births to dropouts were outside marriage and this is compared to the ten percent of births to women who have received their master's degree and a high school diploma (Bloom). There are many consequences in store for high school dropouts.
Education is the key to success and there are multiple ways to boost a student’s confidence while attending high school to enhance a better future for his/herself. It is our job as parents and faculty to keep the students engaged and aware of the repercussions of dropping out and to do everything in our power to keep the students productive and interactive to ensure a bright