A strong research process occurs deliberately and strategically after careful planning. That’s not at all how I approached the background check crisis. My process occurred organically, in urgent reaction to what I witnessed as an employee of Washington’s Department of Children Youth and Families (DCYF). Before I did anything else, of course I scried within the dark web, as one does. I encountered extremism and competing siloed information about separate parts of a dynamic problem.
Dynamic problems require examination from every angle. For three years, I sought diverse perspectives about incomplete caregiver background checks and mined for public record information. In the end, it became apparent DCYF strategically lowered background check standards to increase caregiver supply. The Washington State Legislature and children and youth committees cosigned this strategy. Rather than uncovering a conspiracy, I uncovered an ill advised policy solution to an issue of supply and demand.
Solving a problem usually requires understanding it. In our modern information environment, the most ridiculous or unreliable information floats on the surface. To collect information safe for consumption, we have to dive deeper. The information we collect there still needs to be strained and boiled through critical analysis. Coming June 2026, I will begin posting short clips on the homepage, chronicling my entire “research process” from beginning to end.
A strong democracy can respond proactively to bad policy decisions. To do that, we have to understand the problems we want to solve, as well as their proposed solutions. You don’t need a masters degree to do any of that. This page is dedicated to helping you conduct and critically analyze your own research. Here, I’ll house documents and examples relevant to my research, walking you through the steps I took to access and analyze them in various ways. This page will update periodically but look for the bulk of material to arrive June 2026.
In the Background 