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WTML Newsletter
Points of interest:
Library Research
STEAM
Education
Resource Center
Libraries
Obsolete?
In the Spotlight
Turn your questions into answers! April 2018
Inside this issue:
A Few Words on
Library Research 1
Director’s Corner 2
From the
Reference Desk 3
In the Spotlight 4
WTML Contact Info 4
Library’s Newest
Titles 5
Newsletter compiled by
Volume 9, Issue 1
A Few Words on Library Research Bruce Miracle
Research is a recurring part of life for every college student, and
most realize they will have to do a great deal of it to complete their
chosen major. Even so, a major research project can present a
daunting challenge. Here are a few tips that can help make the
process a little less intimidating.
First, you need to be very clear about what you are researching; in other words, what is
the assignment? Read what your instructor has actually asked you to do on your
syllabus or elsewhere. Both as a librarian and sometime teacher, I find that students are
often not clear about what they are supposed to do. If you are not sure, you should
always ask your instructor for clarification.
When choosing a database, a good place to start is EBSCOhost on the library resources
page. You can select a subject area from the top and simultaneously search all the
pertinent databases for that topic. The drawback is that you may get too much stuff. You
can limit results by either revising your search or choosing an individual database from
the right column.
A more sophisticated and focused way to search is to go to the Online Databases link and
select an individual database, either from the dropdown A to Z menu, or by title or
subject search block. For an assignment in business, a good resource to try is Business
Source Complete – it not only has a large number of journal articles, but also various
types of reports and analyses. Education students might try Professional Development
Collection and limit to Full Text. For Psychology students, PsycARTICLES contains an
all full text collection of some of the most-used journals in the field. Psychology and
Behavioral Sciences Collection is also good, as is PsycINFO for citation searches.
CINAHL –with Full Text is one of a number of resources useful for Nursing. Criminal
Justice and Law Enforcement students should try Lexis-Nexis Academic (also useful for
Business). I think these examples are enough for you to get the idea.
There is not a specialized product for all majors or subjects, but you should be able to
find much of what you need in those we have. For a variety of information (especially
journal articles), two excellent resources are Academic Search Complete and JSTOR. You
can also go to the Full-Text Finder search on our library resources page to find out if we
have a particular journal or magazine in full-text in any of our databases. If we have it,
you can link directly to it and access the issue you want. Of course, one of the most
obvious places to look for stuff is our online catalog (uSearch link on the resource page).
You can search by author, title, subject etc. and find out what we have in our physical
collection, and it also links you directly to our various eBook collection as well as our
videos (Films on Demand).
Finally, if you are needing help with your library research, one of the smartest strategies
is simply to ask us. This applies to in library or away. You can ask at the desk or contact
us by phone or online. We even monitor the library email for help requests through most
the holiday breaks. The point is don’t flounder around in research despair – let us help
you.
Page 2 WTML Newsletter
In the newsletter last fall, one of the items announced the weeding of the curriculum collection and the free materials available for the taking.
Anytime the library undertakes a weeding project, we receive many comments from users questioning why we are removing items from the collection. There are numerous reasons we weed, but this time the answer was easy. The materials we withdrew were dated and no longer a help to our education students. We needed room to add current materials to better support our students.
The WTML is pleased to announce a partnership with the Educational Studies Unit (ESU) to form a STEAM center. The library is housing the collection of STEAM materials recently purchased by the ESU and making them available to Union students as well as the P-12 educational partners. The collection includes 3-D printers, compound microscopes with universal smartphone optics, and numerous kits for areas such as law enforcement, dentistry, biomechanics, and other STEAM topics. The STEAM Educational Resource Center is located in the Timeless Tales room on the first floor of the library.
On April 19 a 3-D printer demonstration was provided for members of the Union College Board of Trustees. How these printers can be used in support of the Boys and Girls Club, math and science education, and to build interest in STEAM across the curriculum was discussed. At the time this newsletter is being produced, plans are being made for a grand opening and demonstration for Union students that will take place early Fall 2018.
The staff of the WTML and the ESU invite all members of our community to stop in the library and explore the new STEAM Educational Resource Center.
Enchantment by Jane Yolen
Stack by stack, shelf by shelf,
I pick out books all by myself.
Page by page, line by line,
word by word, I make books mine.
With a wave of a card
like a wizard’s right hand—
and an alphabet-alchemy,
life is just grand.
Director’s Corner by Tara Cooper
MakerBot Replicator 3D printer
www.booklistreader.com
Page 3 WTML Newsletter
Like
Weeks-Townsend
Memorial
Library
on Facebook!
Follow
WeeksTownsend
@weekstownsend
on Twitter!
From the Reference Desk Sean Jump
Are libraries obsolete? No. That was simple, wasn’t it? But it’s still a question that rears its ugly head now and then. If you work in the information sciences, you occasionally run across dire prophecies foretelling the demise of libraries in the digital age. These predictions of bibliographic apocalypse are usually based on the idea that as more and more information becomes readily available online and more and more people become skilled in sorting that information for their own ends, libraries as we know them will gradually die out like dinosaurs. Yours truly actually took those gloomy prognostications pretty seriously once upon a time. In fact, while pursuing my M.A. I planned to write a paper about the possibility that Google would eventually gobble up every library in the civilized world, including my own beloved WTML. But when I submitted a proposal along those lines, my instructor was decidedly unimpressed. He said he didn’t know anybody in the field who took such predictions seriously and that if I did choose to write on the subject, I would first have to convince him that it was a topic he should take seriously. I chose another topic. Though I still considered the issue a legitimate one, my instructor’s comments did force me to think about it a little more thoroughly. Yes, the digital age has transformed the information world in a powerful way, but why shouldn’t there be room for libraries in such an epoch? What evidence is there that libraries are really going the way of the Dodo anytime soon? Honestly, I don’t see much of that kind of evidence. Certainly, the Internet has radically changed how the WTML serves some of its patrons, and in most ways this change has been overwhelmingly for the better. It’s a tremendous boon to our patrons that we can offer them such a wide range of electronic resources—databases, e-books, streaming videos, online tutorials—and that they can access them without ever leaving the comfort of their own homes. It’s a veritable miracle of modern technology that a student can now research, compose, and cite his term paper without ever actually setting foot in the library. But where is he getting all these resources? From the library. Yes, some of the same material can be accessed via Google Scholar, for instance, but then again some of it can’t, and even many of the articles and e-books that Google Scholar might provide theoretical access to can only be opened up if you pay a fee. Why bother when your library offers you all that and more, for free? Moreover, the fact is print books and journals aren’t gone yet, nor is it likely they’ll vanish as a whole in the immediate future. Books, magazines, and newspapers continue to be churned out by publishers in huge quantities, and that means somebody is consuming all those printed items. Right now, electronic books (of which I am an enormous fan) are still largely a supplement to printed items. The day may come when e-books have totally replaced their traditional counterparts, but it hasn’t happened yet. Tomorrow doesn’t seem real likely, either. Finally, there are the librarians. As long as there is information to be accessed, sorted, and put to use, there will need to be someone who is actually good at doing all that. Students and other library patrons still frequently need assistance in locating that special book, video, or article, and it’s to the folks behind the information desk that they turn to for help. Librarians fill a niche that is not easily replaced. So I’m not too worried. Experience is the great teacher, and my years at the WTML have proven not only the value but the utility of libraries. The coming years may see libraries continue to change and adapt to the amazing, ever-evolving world of information science, but while some of the particulars of those libraries may change, the need for them will not.
Page 4 WTML Newsletter
In the Spotlight...
Kate Stittums & Auburn McCrary
Auburn McCrary is currently a Junior and has
been at Union for three years. She is in the
athletic training program and will be graduating
next May (2019).
Auburn is from Pisgah, Alabama, a town that she
says is smaller than Barbourville. She came to
Union for cross country and track & field. She
loves to travel to just about anywhere. Her hope
is to be able to travel to different parts of the
world with her job.
Kate Stittums is a Senior and has been at Union
for four years. She’s from Harlan County, Kentucky.
She enjoys playing basketball and was on the
women’s team here at Union.
She likes to hang out with her friends, eat, and binge
watch Netflix!
Kate wants to become a dentist. She will be
attending the University of Kentucky College of
Dentistry in the fall.
Please join us as we welcome
Kate Stittums and Auburn McCrary as
the Library’s newest employees!
Be sure to visit the WTML @ http://www.unionky.edu/library
WTML Contact Info
Information Desk
Phone: 606-546-1240
Email:
Reference Desk Phone: 606-546-1243
Email:
Page 5 WTML Newsletter
TITLE CALL #
Impact! : asteroids and the science of saving the world / Elizabeth Rusch photos by Karin Anderson JUV 551.397 R951i 2017
Dolphins : voices in the ocean / Susan Casey. JUV 599.53 C338d 2018
Itch! : everything you didn't want to know about what makes you scratch / by Anita Sanchez illustrated by Gilbert Ford. JUV 612.79 S211i 2018
Fallingwater / Marc Harshman and Anna Egan Smucker art by LeUyen Pham. JUV 728.372092 H324f 2017
Look! what do you see? : an art puzzle book of American & Chinese songs / Xu Bing with illustrations by Becca Stadtlander. JUV 793.73 B613l 2017
Voices from the Second World War : stories of war as told to children of today. JUV 940.53 V889 2016
Bad girls with perfect faces / by Lynn Weingarten. JUV W423b 2017
Out of wonder : poems celebrating poets / Kwame Alexander with Chris Colderley and Marjory Wentworth illustrated Ekua Holmes. JUV King 808.1 A376o 2017
Ramp Hollow : the ordeal of Appalachia / Steven Stoll. KAH 333.3174 S875r 2017
Above the waterfall : a novel / Ron Rash. KAH 813.54 R224a 2015
Haunted holidays : twelve months of Kentucky ghosts / Roberta Simpson Brown and Lonnie E. Brown. KAH 133.109769 B879h 2015
Rereading Appalachia : literacy, place, and cultural resistance / edited by Sara Webb-Sunderhaus and Kim Donehower. KAH 302.22440974 R428 2017
The Foxfire book of simple living : celebrating fifty years of listenin', laughin', and learnin' / edited by Kaye Carver Collins, Jonathan Blackstock, and Foxfire students. KAH 309.175 F795s 2016
Ramp Hollow : the ordeal of Appalachia / Steven Stoll. KAH 333.3174 S875r 2017
Government bullies : how everyday Americans are being harassed, abused, and imprisoned by the Feds / Rand Paul with Doug Stafford. KAH 353.46 P324g 2012
Tales from Kentucky sheriffs / William Lynwood Montell. KAH 363.28209769 M776t 2011
Muhammad Ali : the story of a boxing legend / Alan Goldstein [foreword by George Foreman]. KAH 796.83092 A398Xg 2014
Appalachia Revisited : New Perspectives on Place, Tradition, and Progress / edited by William Schumann and Rebecca Adkins Fletcher. KAH 974 A646 2017
Running on Red Dog Road : and other perils of an Appalachian childhood / Drema Hall Berkheimer. KAH 975.473042092 B512r 2016
Kentucky Confederates : secession, Civil War, and the Jackson Purchase / Berry Craig. KAH 976.903 C886k 2018
Windows into the soul : surveillance and society in an age of high technology / Gary T. Marx. 303.483 M392w 2016
Hearsay : artists reveal urban legends / Jan Harold Brunvand, PhD. 398.20973 B911h 2015
Molecular biology : structure and dynamics of genomes and proteomes / Jordanka Zlatanova, Kensal E. van Holde 572.8 Z82m 2016
Physical exercise interventions for mental health / edited by Linda C.W. Lam 615.82 P578 2016
Perspectives on recreational therapy / David R. Austin, Bryan P. McCormick 615.85153 P467 2017
Interested in the newest titles the library has received?
Check out the list below for some of the newest titles the library has received this semester.
