We have observed that nonprofit (and other non-academic) organizations are engaged in conducting literature reviews. While guidance is widely available for academic literature reviews, this guidance doesn’t “fit” the context of non-academic literature reviewing. Specifically, nonprofit and other organizations conduct literature reviews in a context where they have different motivations, resources, processes, timelines, and outputs. In this project, we are doing a scan of scholarly, web-based, and grey literature to gather background on how literature reviews in non-academic contexts take place, to examine whether guidance for literature reviews in this context exists, to distill insights that may guide what kind of guidance could be appropriate. We expect outcomes from this project to take the shape of: an annotated bibliography and an open guide or toolkit to support this kind of research.
Graduate Academic Assistants
Tarene Thomas
Project Outputs
Literature Review Process Postcard
Informational postcard based on the literature reviews web guide.Doing a literature review: Community organizations and nonprofits
A web guide aimed at non-profits and community groups on how to conduct literature reviews.Literature reviews beyond the university: Gathering guidance
University students aren't the only ones doing literature reviews, but most guides are geared toward them. How can we support the needs of others doing this work?