In assessment task one you will explore the peer-reviewed literature in an area of interest related to Emergency and Disaster Management (E&DM). You will identify an area of interest, locate relevant peer-reviewed literature and provide a short analysis of three pieces of literature which you select. Your response to this assessment task is based upon your engagement with the broader academic literature, unit content and the posts you make to the activity forums.

Your response will include four sections:

Section 1) Your forum post(s) from Week 2 (What are your burning interests?), which you may refine for section 1) of the assessment submission;

Section 2) Your search methodology, including your initial strategy and any refinements you made, for identifying three peer-reviewed pieces of literature relevant to your burning interest; 

Section 3) Your brief (250 - 300 words per article) overview of each of your three articles including why it is was chosen, it's significance to your burning interest, and the key findings; and 

Section 4) A direct copy of your original Week 2 forum post (What are your burning interests?)

Your response may be up to 1500 words, not including the copy of the forum posts (Section 4). The copy of the forum posts is therefore in addition to the word count.

The assessment criteria for this course is in the form of a rubric, which is available from the Moodle unit site.

You will be assessed on:

• Application of knowledge and skills relative to accessing peer-reviewed sources through University resources;
• Interpretation of peer-reviewed research, and understanding of how this links to your identified area of interest;
• Communication and presentation.
  

Through this task you will explore 'gaps' in the literature, or areas requiring further research related to your area of interest. Using the three pieces of peer-reviewed literature from assessment task one, you will summarise the key gaps/ areas for further research. Note: this should not be a repetition of the limitations and/ or future directions articulated in the three pieces, rather this summary should represent a cohesive consideration of all three articles, and what these articles tell you about future research options. Additional literature, that is, literature beyond the three articles from assessment task one will provide additional support to guide your assertions.

Your response will, therefore, consist of four sections, including:

Section 1) Summary statement about your area of interest and where this interest fits in terms of the phases in emergency and disaster management;

Section 2) Discussion related to the 'gaps' in literature which could be further explored; 

Section 3) What phase or particular aspect of emergency and disaster management the gaps relate to and how or in what ways the filling of the gaps could contribute to best practice in an aspect of emergency and disaster management; and

Section 4) At least one research question (or one overarching question and associated sub-questions), using the guiding principles from the unit content.

Assessment task two will be up to 900 - 1200 words in total and importantly your response must be supported by appropriate literature (the articles you used for assessment task one at a minimum should be included).

The assessment criteria for this unit is in the form of a rubric, which is available from the Moodle unit site.

You will be assessed on:-

• Understanding of gaps/areas for further research in existing literature
• The ability to concisely communicate information
• Development of a meaningful research question/s using principles explored in the unit.
  

Assessment task three asks you to select and critically reflect on two different examples of research communication relevant to one of the four phases of emergency and disaster management (that is, prevention/mitigation, preparedness, response or recovery). Through this process, you will consider the area of interest for the researchers/ research teams, the particular topic being communicated in the examples and their communication of key aspects of the research process, for example, background to the research, research question(s), methodology and findings.

To guide your work, you will incorporate discussion on the following:

· The research topic (for each communication example);

· The relationship of each research topic to emergency and disaster management and in what ways each piece of research could be used to inform best practice in the sector;

· Type of communication approach (for each example);

· The strengths and limitations of each communication approach and the particular audience(s) the approach is (could) target;

· Summary statement about the clarity of key elements of the research, including the background, research question(s), methodology and key findings; and

· Statement about possible future directions that will further enhance the body of knowledge in the area of the chosen pieces of research

The assessment task will be between 1500-2000 words in total.

The assessment criteria for this unit is in the form of a rubric, which is available from the Moodle course site.

You will be assessed on:

• Knowledge of the research process
• Skills in interpreting and communicating research findings
• Application of knowledge and skills in the research design and implementation process
• Communication and presentation of knowledge and skills