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COMM-105 Speech Sources

This guide serves as a jumping off point for COMM-105 students who are researching and preparing to give an Informative Meeting Speech or a Speech to Actuate. For more help, contact your friendly neighborhood librarian!

How to Evaluate Any Source

What is a credible source?

Books you get from the library and articles you find in the library databases are almost always reliable and credible. Those books and articles have gone through an editorial process; someone with expertise checked the author's facts and arguments before the book or article was published. You can read more about credibility and reliability here.

Credible or Incredible?

It's always a good idea to apply the CRAAP test to any source you want to use in your research. This test is especially important if you find a source on the internet rather than through the library. 

CRAAP Test: For every source, consider the information Currency and Relevancy, as well as the author's Authority, Accuracy, and Point of View.

How to Evaluate Websites

When you find an article in the PUC databases or read a book or ebook from our collection, you can be fairly sure that they pass the CRAAP Test. Of course, you should check the publication date for Currency. 

Websites are a different story. It can be difficult to know whether information found online is reliable or not. The following video explains how to evaluate websites.