Enhance your awareness of News/ Current events/ Issues around us, develop your critical thinking on them, and their impact on our economy.
From today, start to develop a habit of reading/watching news every day. Sources can be newspaper, TV, internet, radio, etc. ….Take notes on the topics of interest, choose 3 and find out more about them and elaborate with a sentence as below on Part 1. Then highlight your shortlisted 1 out of the 3 to research further, collect various reliable printable materials, such as news articles clippings, statistics report, facts and figures (do not use blogs, unofficial information or personal comments). Expand your thoughts on the issue, how would it affect our economy, society, environment, any positive or negative third party effects, etc…..
Focus on the topic you shortlisted and develop 3 arguments/ thoughts and type in Part 2.

Part 1: List 3 Topics of Interest and elaborate in a sentence: Source: Date:
1. Oil prices rising up again since January, will it continue to rise? Toronto Star 3 Feb 2019
2. TTC’s lawyers to examine Uber commuting service, it’s impact on our economy and society National Post 18 Jan 2019
3. Canadians budgeting far less for Holiday travelling this year while there are more Americans visiting Canada huffingtonpost.ca 4 Feb 2019

Part 2: Only on your shortlisted topic, research further for 3 articles from different source Number the articles, indicate source and date, and highlight key points on them. Think about the issue critically and develop 3 elements/arguments/cause and effects/improvements/what you have learned on the topic, type in boxes on template provided, attach the further research 3 articles in sequence for submission.

3 elements for further research and elaborate them with a couple of sentences

1. What are the reasons for oil prices rising? How do supply and demand affect oil prices? Is Gasoline demand elastic or inelastic? Is it short term or continue to increase in prices long term? Are the increase in prices natural or manipulated?
2. What is the economic impact on increasing oil prices, will it lead to production changes, inflation, increase or decrease of employment opportunities? What other related industries would be affected as well?
3. What are the negative and positive effects of increasing oil prices? In what ways will oil price increase harms/benefits businesses and consumers? Will there be substitutes developed thus reducing our dependence on gasoline?

Grading criteria
3 topics of interest and source on form, quality and relevancy of research 3%
Shortlisted topic, quality of materials collected, organization and presentation 4%
Thoughts on the elements of further research 3%
Total 10%
George Brown College GSSC1034 – Introduction to Economics
Professor: W Kwan GSSC1034- 19

Last Name _________________First name______________ Class _______ Date ________

Economics/ News Topic Research
***Download this form from Blackboard, keep the format and type content in boxes

Step 1: Research 3 topics of interest from 3 different news sources, briefly describe each topic with one sentence, indicate source and date in boxes below. Highlight and bold 1 out of the 3 topics clearly that you shortlist to research further.

Part 1: 3 Topics of interest: Source: Date:
1.

2.

3.

Part 2:
Step 2: Research further on the topic that you have shortlisted by finding 2 more news articles on it, get more information, perspectives, statistics….from as many other sources as possible

Step 3: Print out all articles, number them and clearly indicate the source and date on top of each article separately.

Step 4: Read each article carefully, highlight key points and information that inspire you.

Step 5: Using your critical thinking skills, develop 3 different open-ended arguments / thoughts / questions that enable further research on your shortlisted topic, don’t conclude. Type them out in 30-50 words in boxes below:

1.

2.

3.

Step 6: Attach the articles in sequence with your typed form as cover page for submission. Paste small/flimsy newspaper articles neatly on letter size paper, large ones can be folded and partially pasted, so that they are extendable to be read.