How to Conduct Background Research and Create an Outline

As a member of the Ug99 task force, your ultimate objective is to evaluate proposed solutions for a problem. To be able to do that, you have to understand what problem is being addressed. In this task, you have been asked to:

• Review parts of the proposals and gain a basic understanding of the solution each proposal is suggesting.
  
  
• Do some preliminary research, which will help you understand the Ug99 problem.
  
  
• Create an outline to help you begin to organize the project.
  
  

This step-by-step will help you complete your work.

Read the Executive Summaries and Conduct Background Research on Ug99

1. Prepare to complete your work in this task.
   1. Review the email from Armando Russo. Make sure you understand what you are being asked to do. Clarify any questions you have with your mentor.
      
      
   2. Download the proposals attached to Armando's email.
      
      
2. Read the Project Summary of each proposal.
   Working independently, read the project summary of each proposal and take notes on any initial questions you have. You have just started working on this problem, so there may be a lot of new and unfamiliar information in the proposals. As you read, look for terms and phrases that might be important to research. Try to get a sense for how the author describes the Ug99 problem and try to understand what they are proposing as a solution.
   
   
3. Gather background information on Ug99
   Before you can consider the proposals in detail, you need to understand the characteristics of Ug99 and why it is a threat.
   
   
   • Using the links on the resource page (and any other materials you might find independently), research Ug99. As you research, you should look for information that answers your initial questions on the executive summaries you read.
     
     

• You should also gather background material on Ug99. Specifically, work to answer the questions:
  
  
  • What is Ug99?
    
    
  • What characteristics of Ug99 make it a threat?
    
    
  • What are the potential effects of Ug99 on crops and food production?
    
    
• You should also look for key terms and concepts associated with Ug99.
  
  Tip: Keep in mind this is not a comprehensive list of questions you need to answer. As you conduct your research, you should make note of anything you think is important.
  
  
• Take notes as you review the resource materials. You may want to use the Note Taking Template available on the Resources page.
  
  
• You may find it helpful to review the Research Planning Skill Tutorial and make use of the Note Taking Skill Tutorial that you used in Task 1. For your convenience, those have been provided again on the Resources page of this task.
  
  Tip: Though you are trying to understand what each of the proposals is suggesting, you will have an opportunity later in the project to conduct additional research on the proposals. At this stage of the project, you should focus your research on the background of the problem.
  
  

Define the Problem

1. Meet with your team and discuss your findings. Once you have completed your research, meet as a team to discuss information each person discovered during his/her research. Specifically, discuss:
   • The executive summaries of the proposals.
     • What is each proposal suggesting as a long-term solution for Ug99?
     • Were you able to answer the initial questions you created while reading the executive summaries or is there still information you have questions about? Make a note of lingering questions, so you can research them in an upcoming task.
       
       
   • What each person discovered in his/her research of Ug99. How did he/she answer the questions above? (Refer to Step 3a for the questions you should have considered during your research.)
     
     
2. Write a problem statement that answers the question: "What is Ug99 and why is it a threat?" A problem statement should not merely be a summary of your research, but instead should provide some supporting information you have discovered that specifically answers the question above. It should be compact, only 1-2 paragraphs. This problem statement will help guide you as you analyze the proposals, by giving you a concise understanding of the issue they are trying to solve.
   
   

Write Your Outline


Having conducted some initial research and definitively stated the problem, you can begin to organize ideas for your final report, in the form of an outline.

1. Review the Outlining Skill Tutorial if you need information on how to create and format an effective outline.
   
   
2. Working together as a team, brainstorm ideas you will need to cover in your report. Through the course of this project you will be asked to analyze proposals, each suggesting a separate solution for the Ug99 problem. Your job will be to decide which of those proposals your UN FAO task force should fund.
   
   
   1. The research you have conducted so far should give you a good idea of the information that will need to be included in your report to explain the problem. This background information, however, will only be one part of the report.
      
      
   2. As you think about what your report should include, keep in mind what you are being asked to do. You will have multiple proposals to analyze, and based on that analysis, you must suggest one solution. Based on that, how might you organize a report to communicate your analysis and suggested solution?
      
      
   3. It may be helpful to think about reports you have written in the past. How were those reports structured? What kind of information did those reports include?
      
      
3. Organize your ideas by first identifying the major sections your report will need to include. Then, for each major section, think about the kind of supporting information each section would need.
   
   
   1. Based on the research you have conducted so far, you may be able to include more detail in some sections of the outline, particularly in a section where you give background or explain the problem. Fill in the outline with information from your notes, in sections where that information makes sense.
      
      
   2. While you should try to provide as much detail as you can, much of the information you have at this point will probably be at high level. Remember that your outline is a work in progress and will gradually be filled in with more detail, as you get deeper into the task.
      
      

Review and Submit your Work

1. Review your work
   Review your problem statement and outline. Make sure your work is cohesive and represents to efforts of each team member.
   
   

2. Submit your work
   Review the checklist found in the Submit Your Work section of this task and submit your problem statement and your outline to your mentor.

Templates

Note Taking Template
This document is structured to help you organize and capture information related to your research.

General Resources

Global Food Trends
This article highlights issues of world food production and specifically looks at waning grain reserves.

Global Wheat Production Statistics by Country

Green Revolution Overview
This link provides an overview of the Green Revolution. This term is commonly used in many other sources.

UG-99 - Wheat Rust

Billions at risk from wheat super blight
This article introduces Ug99. It discusses where it is spreading and what is currently being done to build a resistance to it.

Wheat Warning-New Rust Could Spread Like Wildfire
This article highlights Ug99, including what it looks like at different stages, how it travels, why it is a threat, and what can and should be done to control it.

Take a Puff Out of Rusts that Blow in the Wind
This article focuses on yellow wheat rust in Africa from the mid to late 1990s and gives a pre-Ug99 historical perspective on wheat rust's havoc and what was being done to control it.

A Matter of Breeding
(This link takes you to the complete magazine, scroll down to pages 20-21 to see the articles.)
This article discusses how developing crops that are resistant to diseases and pests secure food supplies and protect our health and the environment. It provides a helpful overview on the Boom and Bust Cycle, the Green Revolution, and genetic strategies to fight plant disease.

New Strain of Wheat Rust Appears in Uganda
This article discusses Ug99 and offers information on how it spreads and what the impacts of that spread might be.

UN: New Fungus Threatens Wheat Crops
This article discusses how Ug99 is migrating and the implications it may have globally.

Map: Possible Migration Routes
This map shows possible migrations routes of wheat rust Ug99.

New wheat rust strain poses threat to world wheat crop
This article talks about the current stages of wheat rust Ug99 and the race to finding a resistant strain.

Ask the Expert

What is Ug99?

What does Ug99 do to wheat?