Skip to Main Content

Educational Policy: Database Search Examples

This guide will serve as a resource for identifying and locating educational policy papers, white papers, and policy briefs.

Quick Search Tips

  • Use quotation marks to search for a phrase. For example, "position papers".

     

  • Input keywords and phrases that represent different concepts in different search fields. For example, "common core" in the first field and “position papers” in the second will find articles that contain the key phrase, common core, and the key phrase, position papers. 

     

  • Set search limits such as scholarly journals, full-text, or document type.

     

  • Sort results by date or relevance, especially if requested by your professor.

     

  • Look at suggested subjects to narrow your search.

     

  • Use truncation, for example, strateg* will find results with strategic, strategy, strategies, etc.

     

Finding policy statements: Database search example

Undertaking a keyword search
  1. Go to GALILEO Advanced search.
  2. Type position papers in the first row, and put quotation marks around it, so it reads: "position papers". Place quotation marks around two or more words you want to be searched in that precise order. 
  3. In the second row, type the topic you want to find position papers on, for example, literacy OR reading OR writing.
  4. Refine your results using relevant filters in the left-hand panel, e.g., by Geography - select USA and any US states you see.
  5. Skim through your results and save the desired results you want to take a closer look at later. 

 

Finding too many results? Search in an individual education database or a group of education databases

You could also try replicating the same keyword search in an individual education database or a group of education databases.

 

Finding too many results? Modify your search so it is a combined keyword and subject search

If you find too many results, select the drop-down of the "Select a Field (Optional)" button adjacent to "position papers" and choose SU Subject Terms, like in the screenshot below. Doing this will narrow your search further, with results showing up only if "position papers" is in the Subjects section of the record.

Warning: Not all keywords you think of are also subject terms. To undertake a subject search in GALILEO, you need to know what subject term to use. Get ideas for appropriate subject terms by undertaking a keyword search and look a the Subjects section of records' details. 

 

Screenshot of search on position papers and literacy OR reading OR writing in GALILEO Advanced Search

  1. Enter ERIC database. Select 'Thesaurus' on the top left-hand menu.
  2. In the "Browsing: ERIC -- Thesaurus" search field, look up: policy statements. 
  3. Click "Use Position Papers"
  4. Select the box next to "Position Papers"
  5. Select the grey "Add" button at the top of the subjects list. It will create a subject search at the top: (DE "Position Papers").
  6. Select the Search button. It will find all of the results tagged with the subject "Position Papers".
  7. In the search rows, run a keyword search on what you want to find position papers on, e.g., "special education"
  8. Under Search History/Alerts, select the box next to the Search IDs and select "Search with AND". This will search the results tagged with the subject, "Position Papers" and that have the key phrase, "special education."
  9. Refine your search with appropriate filters on the left-hand panel, e.g., by Publication Date. 

The ERIC database search box, followed by an image of the Browsing operation in the ERIC Thesaurus for the word Policy. A second search in the thesaurus for the term Position Papers displays the Related Terms, policy analysis and policy formation.