The Inside Cover

Aug/sep 2007

Volume 1, Number 1

A library, to modify the famous metaphor of Socrates, should be the delivery room for the birth of ideas—a place where history comes to life. - Norman Cousins

 

 

 

It’s happening @ your library

 

Welcome to the faculty and staff version of the Midway College library’s new monthly newsletter. The Inside Cover will feature mostly, if not all, new content each month so don’t be too quick to hit the delete button. Find out what’s happening @ your library. We have new people, new equipment, and new services. If you have any questions or suggestions for the library, just shoot me or Cathy an email. We welcome all comments from faculty and staff.

 

—Sarah Kaip, Reference Librarian

 

 

Who’s new at the library?

 

Carrie Lewis is our new Circulation Supervisor as of July 2007. She will assist you with reserves and interlibrary loan needs. She may also assist with library instruction classes as she has a Master’s in Library Science from UK. She has an additional Master’s in Russian History and has lived in Russia as part of an intensive language study program. She is a devoted UK football and basketball fan, and if there’s anything left of her voice after UK games, she’ll cheer for the Pittsburgh Steelers too. Please stop by to introduce yourself and welcome her. Her extension is 5839, and her email is clewis.

 

 

Mozart according to MySpace?

 

Business sources from boyfriend’s blog? Critical Thinking leaving you in critical condition? If your students are fishing for sources in an information swamp, it is time to send them to the library to become research literate. Let the Reference Librarian show your students how to find scholarly sources and how to evaluate websites and other sources. She will have them thinking about information in ways never imagined. Make a date with Sarah Kaip by calling 5744 or emailing skaip. Instruction can be general or tailored to meet the needs of a particular assignment.

 

 

Only the best thing since sliced bread

 

Sarah is currently creating a set of interactive web-based library instruction tutorials called MILTON—Midway Information Literacy Tutorials Online. (Can the Equine faculty think of a famous horse named “Milton”?) All students are welcome to enjoy the thrill of online library instruction, especially SCD and online students who cannot get to the library for instruction, and we encourage you to point them in that direction. Expected date of completion is sometime in September. There are 7 modules that cover the following:

 

  1. Thinking about information and research
  2. Developing a topic
  3. Differentiating the types of publications (magazines, peer-reviewed journals, trade publications)
  4. Search strategies for locating articles
  5. Searching for and evaluating websites
  6. Finding books
  7. Avoid plagiarism and citing sources

 

NOTE to faculty of online and SCD students: the library intends to promote its services more aggressively to online and SCD students. If you have any suggestions for the library on how to meet the needs of these students better, please contact Sarah.

 

 

It’s every librarian’s worst nightmare…

 

… and dream come true all at once. Some of the most widely read books in the country are books that have been challenged and banned in schools and public libraries. Books that make newspaper headlines also make bestseller lists.

 

During Banned Book Week, September 29-October 6, the library will make a display of the top 100 most frequently challenged books in the United States between 1990 and 2000. Come in and enter our drawing by telling us your favorite book on the list. If we draw your name, you win a prize (to be announced). There is a separate drawing for just faculty and staff. We’ll also let you know which book received the most nominations.

 

 

Is there anything good to read in the library?

 

Everything in the library is good to read. Seriously, for those able to squeeze in extracurricular reading during their busy semester, the library recently created a book exchange. Thanks to Angela Sizemore’s brilliant idea (she didn’t win that Employee Award for nothing) and to the Nursing Department’s generous donation of a turnstile bookshelf, you may now donate books, take some, leave with no take, or take with no leave. But please do not leave textbooks. The book exchange is located between the periodical browsing shelves and the computers in the reference section. So what’s your next idea Angela?

 

 

Why are there few fingerprints on the library computers?

 

Because they are all new. Thanks to the IRIS staff for equipping us with the latest technology. All public computers in the library—both the computer lab and the reference computers—are new and sport Windows Vista, the new graphical operating system that replaces Windows XP. Now there’s no conceivable reason for students not to do homework! If you think of it, you might remind students that they will need a jump drive and a code to print. The computers do not have a floppy or CD drive, and every computer is now hooked up to the copy machines for printing.

 

 

Extra white space?

 

If there’s extra white space on your assignments or syllabi, use it to add the librarian’s name and contact information so students know who to go to when they’re hanging on a research limb. You can also tell students that there is an appointment book on the reference desk to sign up for one-on-one consultations with the librarian.

 

 

Thanks for reading. Be on the lookout for October’s edition of rousing news about the library.