Choosing a topic is research! Exploring your topic and getting some background information at the start of a research project can help you identify useful information (i.e. a theme or subtopic to focus on, possible questions to be answered, timelines, etc.) and save you time. This is also a good way to refine your search - to take a broad topic (education, for example) and narrow it to something that you can cover in a more meaningful way in your paper (do programs like Teach for America really work to improve opportunity gaps?).
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