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We have just upgraded our much-used Academic Search Elite database to the
Academic Search Premier version. According to EBSCO, the database publisher,
"The upgraded Academic Search Premier database will increase the
number of journals abstracted and indexed from the current 3,485 to 8,035;
the number of full text journals provided from 2,053 to 4,515; and the
number of peer reviewed titles accessible from 1,507 to 3,630." This is a
substantial broadening of resources available to Millikin students, faculty
and staff; and because of our state-wide consortial relationships, at least
for the current year the upgrade comes to us at no additional cost to the
library.
Starting in early October, you will be able to
more easily locate electronic full text of articles you discover when
searching many of the library's databases. Once you have searched as usual
in a database and have displayed a citation, click on the "Find it!" button to see if that article
is available in full text in any of the other databases to which the library
subscribes. If the article is not available electronically, you will be
offered other options, including a link to our online catalog (to see if we
subscribe in paper) and to an electronic interlibrary loan form.
And speaking of electronic periodicals, want
to know if the library subscribes to a particular electronic full-text
periodical? A new Quicklink on the library's home page,
electronic
periodicals list, provides access to that information via Find
e-Journal. If we subscribe to your periodical or it is available
somewhere for free, you will be directed to the electronic home(s) of that
title.
FYI: OCLC WorldCat, our international cataloging and interlibrary loan
database, has recently reached
one billion holdings (1,000,000,000)!
That is to say, the more than 53,548 libraries (many in consortia) in
96 countries and territories that are currently OCLC members have recorded
one billion instances of ownership of a portion of the 61 million items in
the database. And most of these items may be borrowed through our library's
interlibrary loan agreements!
With fall semester well underway, the Research and
Instruction librarians (Barb Bolser, Cindy Fuller, Joe Hardenbrook, and
Amanda Pippitt) have been busy canvassing the campus and showing students
the Library's many services and research tools. This has included visiting
the 29 sections of the University Seminar to distribute "Research Idol," the
Library's self-guided tour that is completed by the freshmen to introduce
them to locations and services in Staley Library.
However, the bulk of the librarians' time is spent in the
CWRR classes. Librarians conduct one session for each of the 29 CWRR1
sections. This session includes a discussion of plagiarism, citing sources,
and a demo of the Library website. Also, in this semester's three sections
of CWRR2, librarians will spend the equivalent of one in-class week with students.
Here the instruction focuses on how to retrieve and evaluate information. A
hands-on opportunity to search the library catalog and databases is also
given.
In addition, the librarians have conducted specialized research
instruction sessions for classes in biology, chemistry, communication, education,
music, nursing, theatre, and PACE. Interested in scheduling such a research
instruction session? Consult the library's
research
instruction web page and contact Joe Hardenbrook at X3692 or
jhardenbrook@millikin.edu .
This semester also marks the introduction of the library's
Blackboard-based Information Literacy
Assessment Quiz. The librarians developed this instrument to measure what students
are learning and retaining when it comes to library and research skills that
are taught by the librarians over the entire CWRR sequence, as well as
to gauge their teaching emphases and approaches. This semester we will be
testing it at the end of the three off-sequence CWRR2 sections; and
eventually we intend to use it as both a pre- d post- test for all CWRR
sections.
The current exhibit in the
library's display cases is entitled "Campus During Wartime" and is focused
on the Student Army Training Corp preparing to participate in The Great War
(World War One). Featured are a number of photographs and some additional
documents, along with a service flag made by a Millikin student as part of
her Domestic Science curriculum.
The newest of our online exhibits showcases
Eugenia Allin, Millikin's first and longest-serving library director (40
years). Both this page and the "Campus During Wartime" exhibit were
created by Catie Parish as one her last
responsibilities before moving on to her current position of Digital Imaging
Specialist at Illinois State
University's Milner Library in Normal.
The current issue of Chronicle of Higher Education (Sept.29) has a
separate section on
libraries. One of the articles, entitled "Enough with the Stereotypes,"
is summarized, "College librarians are neither Luddite
dinosaurs nor technology-addicted futurists, writes Elizabeth Breakstone.
They're excited and challenged by change, just like everyone else." Indeed.
 
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In this new feature of the library newsletter, members of the library staff will
occasionally highlight a library resource, sometimes a new treasure, sometimes a
long-time favorite. The first two items this time are books, and the third
is an electronic resource.
Battelle, John. The Search: How Google and Its Rivals
Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture. Call Number:
HD9696.8 .U64 G663 2005. Technology journalist John Battelle not only chronicles the
history of Google, the search engine started by two doctoral students in
1996, but takes a look at how it now permeates our everyday life. Have you
ever "googled" yourself? Try it; you'll be surprised. The book also provides
some insight into Google 's corporate culture (or lack thereof), its
marketing and business strategies, the nuts and bolts of search engines, the
dot com boom and bust, privacy issues, and its finances. The author extols
Google's searching capabilities, but points out that it can't search the
"deep web" such as our Library's databases. A recommended read for anyone
interested in business, computer science, and communication. JH
Young, Kevin,
Jelly Roll: a blues. Call Number: PS3575.O798 J45
2005. Poet Kevin Young in his book Jelly Roll: a blues uses a spare,
lyrical language to evoke a richness of imagery and sound. Through the
rhythm of these printed words, he gives his readers music, and not
just blues but other forms as well. His careful and concise vocabulary
delivers a wide range of possibilities in a few broad strokes of the brush.
There is space and time here for the music and images to develop and mature.
And while each poem in this collection can be read separately, they
collectively chronicle the progression of a love affair. This book is an
excellent read for anyone who savors the well-turned phrase and the rich use
of language. BB
Merriam-Webster Online.
Ever wondered how to pronounce a word you have read and understood, but
never heard? (When was the last time you heard zeitgeist, pedant, or
hermeneutics, used in a conversation?) Or wanted the precise meaning of a word that you "kinda
got" in the context of a sentence? If so, you may want to use the
Merriam-Webster Online dictionary. This *free* resource provides audio
pronunciations that sound like people (not robots) speaking, as well as
definitions and a thesaurus. In addition to helping you use and pronounce
words properly in research papers and presentations, you may find several
other strictly-for-fun reasons to use Merriam-Webster Online, such
as:
a) to settle disagreements about mispronunciations,
b) to see what advertisements appear based on the word you have typed, or
c) to look up ordinary words, just to hear any alternate pronunciation (for
example, "tomato").
While the Oxford English
Dictionary (available for on-campus online use) has more comprehensive
definitions and etymologies, the audio pronunciations and brief definitions
in the Merriam-Webster Online dictionary make it a handy reference
tool for everyday use. CF
As you know, every month we create a list of all new titles (books, videos,
music recordings, etc) that we have catalogued the previous month. This
list is sorted in the same subject order as materials are shelved in the
library stacks (Library of Congress classification.) The above link is to
the index of new title lists. Also, look periodically at the constantly
changing display of new books in the library.
Our student workers are another crucial component of the library staff. Amanda Pippitt has updated this page of pictures of
our
student staff.
We have received some attractive applications for
Archives Associate vacancy, the position that Catie Parish held
until earlier this September. We have begun reviewing these applications to
determine which candidates merit telephone interviews, after which we will
check references for those candidates we are considering bringing on campus
sometime in October.
The September/October issue of the Decatur
Public Library's
Connections (p.2) talks about the reading preferences of Millikin's
president, Doug Zemke. He lists the "top five favorite books that [he
has]
read" as Martin Luther King's and Billy Graham's autobiographies, Atlas
Shrugged by Ayn Rand, From the Inside Out by Tom Payne, and
Sword of Shannara,
a fantasy epic by Terry Brooks. He says he likes autobiographies "that
provide insight into the minds of people who have made an impact (both good
and bad) on life and society. It is how common people make uncommon
accomplishments that intrigues me."
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Mini-update on International Programs: Eight students are
aiming to study abroad during the Spring
semester 2006. Three are planning to be with the Tabor program in Paris, two
will be going to Australia and one will be in Spain, one is registered with
Semester at Sea, and one has applied to go to New Zealand.
In January 2006, three
international immersion classes are
headed for Chile, the European Union, and Paris, France. Students currently
abroad have sent more reports, with
Beth writing from
New Zealand again and two students describing their time so far in London (Kyle
and
Sarah). |
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