Library Love Fest 2010 - a.k.a. Thesis Prospectus

Korrin B.

May 22, 2010 - 7:45 PM

This last Friday at 4:00pm, I reached the deadline to post a rough draft of my thesis prospectus on the Blackboard website. Therefore, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were spent with an old, dear friend of mine. Our relationship falters from time to time, but there always ends up being at least one instance throughout an academic year where we reunite, best buddies once again. Some dread the library; I embrace it as my companion. I nestle up behind the Dewey Decimals section on the fourth floor, sip my bottle of Kombucha, and immerse myself in whatever my topic at the time may be. At one point during my library love fest this week, it dawned on me that I had spent 14 hours out of an elapsed 24-hour period in the library. That is over half a day and yet, I felt just fine about it. When I needed a break, I would skip up and down the aisles of books or do some quick yoga poses off in a corner.

Throughout this term, I have gone through what seems like thousands of thesis topic ideas. My main topic is homelessness, but in order to address this topic in any kind of reasonable manner, it is imperative to break it down. Homelessness is a topic that runs off into so many different directions, from mental illness and family dynamics to federal policy and nonprofit work. Some of the thesis topics I contemplated along the way were as follows:

• How is homelessness different on the West Coast than it is on the East Coast?

• What can a case study of homelessness in four West Coast college towns tell us about the characteristics of homelessness and the most effective ways to deal with it?

• Is the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act an effective public policy for educating homeless youth within the Eugene School District 4j?

• What are the characteristics of homelessness based off of the 2010 Project Homeless Connect of Lane County event?

• How can St. Vincent DePaul be used as a community model for effective work toward ending homelessness?

As you can see, I came across many ideas during the process. The biggest problem was that each idea was truly fascinating to me. I wanted to do all of them! It took a few meetings with my departmental thesis advisor, Professor Laura Leete, and a lot of reading to finally come up with my final thesis topic that I could actually form a prospectus on.

I will officially be doing my thesis on the Homeless Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program (HPRP). HPRP is a $1.5 billion program that was a part of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. I will be doing a case study to see if this is an effective federal policy within Lane County, Oregon and use my findings to comment on the policy as a whole. I am so excited and could already feel myself completely nerding out over it as I spent hour after hour organizing my thoughts in the library.

After three days of a ton of research, several outlines, many rounds of my inability to not thoroughly think through every word, and many proofreads, I remember leaning back in my chair and smiling. There it was - the beginning of my baby. I was so proud of myself. I posted it that Thursday night, way before my deadline.

Throughout week nine, I will be organizing my PowerPoint presentation to give to my class, professor, and advisor on Friday. It is a twenty-minute presentation followed by a thirty-minute question and answer portion. Everyone will give me their feedback and then I will have one more week to finalize my prospectus, get it signed and approved by my advisor, and then pack and leave to Atlanta!

Overall, I am so excited about this thesis process. I think it is going to be such an amazing and rewarding experience the day I finally defend it and am done here in the grand Robert D. Clark Honors College at the University of Oregon.