JSTOR Launches Register and Read

Saw this item back in March, and finally got around to it. Got some help in gaining some understanding of "The man in the high castle" by Philip K. Dick.

Open Access Spreads to Miami University

From ALA Magazine:

The librarians of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, joined the ranks of the worldwide open-access (OA) movement May 14 by voting to make their scholarly articles freely available in the university’s institutional repository, the Scholarly Commons. Based on Harvard University’s model policy, MU’s open-access principles take effect immediately and make the libraries the first department on Miami’s campus to successfully pass an open access policy.

Statistical Abstract saved

It looks as though the lifetime achievement award bestowed upon Statistical Abstract of the United States at this past ALA midwinter awards was premature. Dismaying librarians, the government announced last year that publication of the demographics powerhouse would cease with the 2012 issue. Today, however, database aggregator ProQuest announced that it will continue publication of the work—in print and online—with the 2013 issue, meaning that there will be no gap in coverage.

Encyclopaedia Britannica going digital

Fans of the printed word will no doubt breathe a sentimental sigh over this news: after 244 years, Encyclopaedia Britannica is ceasing production of its multivolume reference books, shifting its focus to online encyclopedias and educational tools, company executives announced on Tuesday. Britannica usually prints a new set of tomes every two years, but 2010's 32-volume set will be the last one ever produced. "Everyone will want to call this the end of an era, and I understand that," said Britannica president Jorge Cauz. "But there's no sad moment for us." Print encyclopedias account for less than 1 percent of Encyclopaedia Britannica’s revenues, with curriculum products and other educational tools bringing in 85 percent and the remaining revenues coming from online subscriptions to its website.

Journal Showcases Dying Art of the Research Paper

Gretchen Ertl for The New York Times - William H. Fitzhugh publishes The Concord Review, featuring research papers written by high school students.

Reward

A young man I recognized came out of a study room in the Reference area on the lower level, and asked for his library card back. I knew his face; he's probably been coming to the Library for at least a couple of years that I've been here.

He told me that I'd helped him with research for his Science Fair project.

"How'd you do?" I wondered.

"Reached the national semi-finals." He beamed, then thanked me.

That is the reward of being a librarian.

A reference question

Received a call from a Newsday reporter, Carol Polsky, doing research on Harvey Milk. There's a new movie out about him, aptly named Milk. He went to school in Woodmere, or perhaps was from Woodmere (yes, he was; Google searches, including looking in Randy Shilts's book, The Mayor of Castro Street, confirms that), though he graduated from high school in Bay Shore.

I looked at the Hewlett High School yearbooks from 1946, 1947 and 1948, at the reporter's request, to see if I could find any mention of Milk. I did not. All I did find was the name of Mrs. William Milk in 1947's book.

Interesting request. I told her she should get a look at some of the faces in the yearbooks, but she said she was under deadline.

Two questions, a visit

In the afternoon I was asked two reference questions, and Dr. Eisenberg visited.

First, a graduate student who said she had four kids at home came to do work on her PhD dissertation, and wanted books on differentiated instruction. That proved to be, as I anticipated, far too specialized an academic subject for a public library. Hewlett-Woodmere has quite limited book resources on educations (Dewey 371 and 378), but database resources are plentiful. I got her on Galenet and ERIC. That pleased her.

A website (of the Macomb, Michigan School District) defines Differentiated Instruction as a flexible approach to teaching in which the teacher plans and carries out varied approaches to content, process, and product in anticipation of and in response to student differences in readiness, interests, and learning needs (Tomlinson, 1995, p. 10).

A college website has an entire web page on differentiated instruction.

Second, a young woman who turned out to be a teacher (high school, perhaps) was looking for a book containing scripts on Twilight Zone episodes. HWPL does own such a book: As timeless as infinity: the complete Twilight Zone scripts of Rod Serling. Well, it's not complete.

Hardly complete; there were 5 seasons (36, 29, 37, 18, and 36 episodes). At any rate, the script the teacher wanted wasn't in the book. It was The Shelter (episode 3, Season 3). She planned to use it by juxtaposing it to some other element. Sounded interesting. She had a printout with other titles from other libraries, and was planning to do some more searching.

I told her about LILRC (the Long Island Libraries Resources Council), a consortium of Long Island libraries. Her home library, I told her, would be able to giver her a pass to, say, Hofstra University, if she found that Hofstra had something useful. "I didn't know about that," she said, adding "and I thought I knew libraries pretty well."

Dr. Eisenberg, a retired MD who visits the Library every once in a while (to get books for his wife), stops and schmoozes with as many people as possible when he does so. He can stay for a solid fifteen minutes with one person. Yesterday I told him about the new book I'm reading, Lessons in disaster: McGeorge Bundy and the path to war in Vietnam. We had a short discussion about Bundy, the Viet Nam War, and presidents. Always pleasant to speak with him.

A reference question

A college-age young man (in my college days he would have been called a hippie) asked for material on the effects of the industrial revolution on workers. A fascinating angle on a familiar topic.

I found this book: The Factory girls: a collection of writings on life and struggles in the New England factories of the 1840's / by the factory girls themselves, and the story, in their own words, of the first trade unions of women workers in the United States ; edited by Philip S. Foner.