Contents 

From Kim Kelley

Hot Sites

For Your Information...

Faculty Corner

ILS  Hours and Locations

From Kim Kelley 
Associate Provost, Information and Library Services

As this new semester begins, I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome back all of you who are returning to UMUC as students, faculty, and staff and to greet those who have just become members of the UMUC community. I wish you success in your progress toward your degree.

UMUC is one of the premier distance education institutions, and Information and Library Services (ILS) is a first-class online library. One of your first activities here should be to bookmark the library home page because it is your gateway to all the resources of a traditional library plus more: round-the-clock reference service, 125 databases with full text articles that cover all the topics you are researching, access to the more than ten million print materials in the libraries of the University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions, and tutorials and guides to help you navigate through all stages of the research process. Take some time today to visit the library home page and take a brief tour. Click on the various links to familiarize yourself with what your library has to offer you. For a summary of the services and resources ILS provides, consult the library brochure and make it a point to read the library newsletter published three times a year (at the start of fall, spring, and summer terms) for updated information and tips to help you become better researchers.

Ask a Question 24 hours a day!

This summer Information and Library Services (ILS) expanded its 24 hour a day reference service to include phone service. Librarians are available anytime, day or night, by chat, e-mail, and now by phone. You should still call (800) 888-UMUC ext. 7209 during regular office hours. After hours, you can call (800) 295-2084 to reach a librarian. Click on Ask a Question on the ILS Web page for more information about our reference services.

Online Databases

Business Source Premier Enhancements

In the past year Business Source Premier has added two features: company profiles and industry profiles, that improve your capacity to obtain information on companies and industries. In Business Source Premier click on the Company Profiles tab at the top to get company information: overviews, history, competitors, key employees, and in some cases S.W.O.T. (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis. To get industry information: summaries, market information and forecasts, and information on the competitive landscape in an industry, perform the following basic search: name of industry AND industry profile. You can also click on publications and browse alphabetically for both company and industry profiles. The image below illustrates these different types of searches:

New Databases in the Sciences

ILS also added two new databases for scientific research: GeoRef and BioMedCentral. Both are available from the Library Databases and E-Journals page and should be especially useful for research in biotechnology and environmental science.

• GeoRef

  ILS has a one year trial subscription to GeoRef, a database established by the American Geological Institute, which provides citations and abstracts with links to full text articles through in geology, environmental science, geophysics, seismology, and other geosciences. It contains over 2.4 million references to geoscience journal articles, books, maps, conference papers, reports and theses and covers the geology of North America from 1785 to the present and the geology of the rest of the world from 1933 to the present.

• BioMedCentral

BioMedCentral is a collection of open access, peer-reviewed journals in biology and biomedical research. Subjects covered include biochemistry, bioinformatics, biotechnology, ecology, environmental science, and diverse medical and health subjects. All the original research articles in the open access journals published by BioMed Central are immediately and permanently available online without charge or any other barriers to access. In addition, the institutional subscription offers an advantage to UMUC researchers who pay a reduced article-processing fee if they submit articles for publication in any of the journals published by BioMed Central (full list of these journals).

New E-Journal Collection in Sociology

• Sage full text Collections: Sociology
  
  The Sage full text Collection in Sociology is a powerful research tool containing 28 full text peer-reviewed journals in sociology. Some of the journals that cover childhood, contemporary sociology, comparative sociology, consumer culture, classical sociology, ethnic studies, gender studies, leisure studies, social theory, sociology of sport, and sociology of work and employment (labor studies) date back to 1982. See http://www.csa.com/csa/factsheets/sagesoc.shtml for more information and a list of the journals included.

Hot Sites... Images on the Web

Finding images on the Web can be made easier by using the right tools. We suggest a few sites that can help you to find images by collection or using a search tool as well as two tutorials to help you learn more about finding and using images from the Web.

• Google Image Search
  The popular and powerful Google Web search tool includes a powerful image search feature, which indexes over 880 million images. An FAQ is available, as well as an advanced search feature that allows you to limit and filter your searches to improve your results.
  
  
• Berkeley Digital Library SunSITE Image Finder
  This site hosts a collection of image sources, including a searchable database of architectural slides from the UC Berkeley Architecture Slide Library, NASA's Ames Research Center, historical photos from the Smithsonian and other digital image collections.
  
  
• An Introduction to Finding Images on the World Wide Web
  A tutorial from the University of Connecticut Libraries that covers the basics of finding and using images on the Web, including a section on copyright issues.
  
  
• Finding Images on the Web
  This site was created by an art librarian at Boston University. A unique feature of this site is a section on downloading and inserting images from the Web into your own documents.

Remember that all images that you find on the Web are subject to copyright and fair use regulations. For more information please read Copyright and Fair Use in the Classroom, on the Internet, and the World Wide Web. In addition, you must cite any image that you use in a paper or project in correct citation format (APA, MLA, Turabian, Chicago, etc.).

For Your Information...

Updated Interlibrary Loan Information

This spring ILS staff revised and updated the interlibrary loan section of the ILS Web page to make the instructions for requesting and retrieving interlibrary loans easier to follow. There is also a new link "Access Requested Documents" that provides information on how to check on the status of your document and retrieve it after you have submitted an interlibrary loan request form.

Online Student Workshops

ILS provides a free online resource in Web Tycho, VLIB 101, designed to help you master library skills and increase your information literacy. We've added some new exercises this fall: a critical thinking exercise and an exercise to familiarize you with using the database Opposing Viewpoints to help select and narrow your research topic. For information about VLIB 101, see Peck Virtual Library Classroom on the library Web page.

In the fall librarians will offer an interactive online student workshop in VLIB 101:

Using the Library Databases Effectively and Efficiently
Learn how to develop good keywords and search statements to improve your search results and how to search multiple databases at one time.

Send an e-mail if you're interested in this workshop. We'll pre-register you and notify you by e-mail once the date and time have been established. Since space is limited, you'll have a better chance to reserve a place in the class.

Two New Topic Selection Tools

• Opposing Viewpoints
  
  You may be wondering what happened to LexisNexis Current Issues. As ILS announced this summer, the vendor discontinued Current Issues. ILS replaced it with Opposing Viewpoints that provides even more options to help you in the topic selection and research question/thesis statement formulation process. To access Opposing Viewpoints:
  
  
  • Click on the link to Library Databases and E-Journals on the ILS Web page.
  • Under Library Databases and E-Journals by Title, click on O and then on the link to Opposing Viewpoints.
  • Once you are in the database in the subject list, click on a subject that interests you. You will retrieve links to articles that provide the pros and cons of that subject.
  • Browse through some of the articles to select your topic and then narrow it down to a specific aspect of a contemporary issue.

  In addition to the articles, you will retrieve a list of related topics that also may help you in your selection. There are also tabs at the top of the results that link to reference articles, statistics, magazine articles, and primary documents that will supply you with information to support the topic you have chosen and help you develop your paper or project by providing concrete support for your point of view.

• Smart Search in ABI/Inform
  
  If you are conducting research in a business and management topic and having difficulty narrowing your topic, try using the SmartSearch feature in ABI/Inform. In that database's basic search box enter a broad topic and then click on Search. In addition to a results list that separates the articles you retrieve into scholarly, magazine, trade, and newspaper articles, you will obtain live links that suggest alternative topics. Click on any of the suggested topics to retrieve links to narrow that topic. You also will retrieve a list of suggested publications that you can browse for information on your topic.

Faculty Corner

Take Advantage of the Library's Electronic Reserves Services!

Information and Library Services offers an Electronic Reserves service for faculty members who teach online or for Web-enhanced courses via Web Tycho. The service provides a convenient way for you to make course materials available to students. The service includes scanning and posting the readings and obtaining necessary copyright permissions. In addition, if full text articles are available via the library's databases, proper instructions or direct links to these articles will be provided.

What we can do for you:

• Process electronic Reserved Readings and post them in your online or web-enhanced classes in Web Tycho
• Obtain copyright permissions for Reserved Readings
• Provide PDF files, instructions or direct links to Reserved Readings through library research databases

What we need from you:

• Your requests at least four weeks before the beginning of the semester, so we can have them ready by the start of your class. If this is impossible, please contact us and we will attempt to fulfill your request in a timely manner.
• If you have used ereserves in the past, please indicate whether you would like to use the same readings again.

What to do:

• First, visit our Ereserve FAQ
• Then, fill out the Ereserve Web Request Form

  When requesting readings via the form, you will now be able to:

  • Display the classes you are teaching and choose readings for all of them at once or one at a time
  • Choose from requests that you made for your previous classes
  • Select from readings that have been requested by others in your discipline for their classes
  • Submit new requests for different types of materials

  We will process your request and post the readings on a first-come, first-served basis.

Information & Library Services Electronic Reserves Team:

The team includes Stephen Miller, Assistant Director for Electronic Services, Yu-Hsiu Wang, Electronic Services Librarian, and Michielle Saunders, Library Technician III. Please feel free to contact us at ereserves@umuc.edu for any questions regarding electronic reserves.

New Acquisitions

View a list of some of our recent acquisitions in distance education, adult learning, assessment, and research methodology.  If you are in Adelphi, visit ILS in SFSC 2255 and browse through our collection. If you would like to borrow any of the books from the ILS collection, you can request them in the library catalog. Books can be picked up at one of the libraries of the University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions, if you live in Maryland, or delivered by mail if you live outside Maryland within the continental United States. If you live abroad, send us an e-mail for information about borrowing them. 

ILS Hours and Locations

Need to find us? Please visit Locations and Hours for more information.