Thoughts from the Library

Please help to support the Valentino Achak Deng Foundation in its quest to build secondary schools in Darfur. Every penny you spend to buy a hard cover copy of What is the What will go toward construction costs, books, equipment and teacher training.

Check out the Free Library for upcoming events throughout the city and suburbs.

It is always a good idea to understand all of your options. Here are a few ways to find unbiased information on all of the candidates:

Vote Help is a “nonpartisan candidate calculator that tracks the main politicians’ stands on important issues.”

2008 Election Guide

NPR:Election 2008

Darfur Scorecard

I find it odd that our community does not have access to a full text database centered around religion. So here is my suggestion…

Try the American Theological Libraries Association’s database ATLASerials Religion Database (s8362338/trial). We have a trial subscription for about a month.

The Prep community now has  access to a database:
Science Online

and a new ebook:
Dictionary of Scientific Biographies

Both are available for use from home.  Check Moodle for username and password.

Begin a conversation about the long term effects of U.S. support of Afghan Mujahideen with The Soviet-Afghan War: A Cold War Chess Piece. Examine the two essays, formulate new questions and create investigative news reports.

Check out what the McShain Library has on this subject:

Ghost wars : the secret history of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet invasion to September 10, 2001 / Steve Coll.

The rise and fall of the Taliban / Kelly Barth, book editor.

The Hidden war a Russian journalist’s account of the Soviet War in Afghanistan by Artyom Borovik

Taliban : militant Islam, oil, and fundamentalism in Central Asia / Ahmed Rashid.

Here is the way to search all of the library resources with ONE search…. No more multiple searches.
Just enter the term(s) you wish to know more about, choose a category and press search.  You will get a list of results grouped by source…a group of books from the McShain Library, a list of articles from JSTOR, a group of books to be accessed through Interlibrary Loan, etc.

Keep in mind this is a trial version and is subject to abrupt changes and that some resources will not return results.

Your comments and suggestions are very much appreciated.

After positive feedback from a few faculty members we now have access to Science Online from Facts on File.  And like I said before, don’t let the name fool you.  There is an excellent section on all types of mathematics.

Be sure to take a look at the videos and flash animation that help to explain some difficult concepts.

As always, be sure to cite your work.  And remember-usernames and passwords are available in Moodle.

Enjoy!

Take a few moments to check out Science Online .  And don’t let the name fool you…there is a lot more here than just science.  The username and password is listed in Moodle.

And while you’re at it take a look at  ABC-CLIO’s History & the Headlines series “A State of Thirst: California’s Ongoing Water Crisis.”

By the way, just what is the difference between a database and a website? A database is a collection of previously published materials from books, newspapers, magazines, journals and transcripts.  Because the information was published in print it was put through some sort of editorial review.  Someone other than the author thought this information was accurate, organized and relevant.  Databases are subscription based and need some kind of authentication to be searched.  Websites can be created by anyone with access to a computer with an Internet connection for free.  Websites are not held to any standards or review.  Sometimes the author is not listed, sometimes you can’t find the date the page was created, and sometimes the information is extremely biased and downright wrong.  Does this mean all websites are bad?  Of course not, but you must choose and evaluate carefully young grasshopper.  To take the guess work out of finding quality websites try a Hawk Search.