Three New Trial Databases Are Now Active

The library is happy to announce the activation of three new databases trials. Send feedback to reference@csp.edu

Global Issues in Context (GALE) - Issues and countries form the core of this product, which uses resources to explain the historical and contemporary conditions necessary to understand global issues, conflicts and events. Global Issues in Context supports research in a wide variety of subject areas, including sociology, current events, civics, politics, science, economics, cultural/religious studies, women’s studies, human rights, English composition and many more. Trial runs through April 9th.

Ethnographic Video Online - Covers the study of human culture and behavior – more than 750 hours and 1,000 films at completion. The collection covers every region of the world and features the work of many of the most influential documentary filmmakers of the 20th century, including interviews, previously unreleased raw footage, field notes, study guides, and more. This first release includes 226 videos totaling roughly 152 hours. Trial runs through April 3rd.

Women and Social Movements, Scholar's Edition - Includes primary historic documents, books, images, scholarly essays, teaching tools, and book and Web site reviews documents the history of women’s activism in public life, and is one of the most heavily visited resources for women’s studies and for U.S. history on the Web. Organized around document projects written by leading scholars, the collection is a powerful research and classroom tool designed to help users develop the skills needed to analyze primary documents and conduct research. Document projects are organized around interpretive questions, each with 20-50 primary documents that address the question. Trial ends March 31st.

Goodbye, BearHunt

QuickSearch via BearHunt will no longer be available beginning May 1st. There are a number of reasons that the library chose to discontinue this federated search service. Most important, as everyone is tightening their belts, BearHunt came at a substantial cost while offering no new content. Also important, usage was low compared to cost. When it first became available, we were excited to try a federated search, but along with other CLIC libraries and the rest of the library world, we’ve realized that the technology needed to support the idea isn’t quite there yet. The relevancy rankings don’t seem to work correctly or consistently, links were frequently broken, searches executed slowly, and the interface left a lot to be desired. We also felt there was a possibility that it was misleading searchers to think they were searching “everything”, while in fact there are a number of both purchased and freely available resources that aren’t included in a BearHunt search. Also, the search is not complete in that it stops at a predetermined time interval instead of continuing until all searches have had a chance to complete. In the end, BearHunt and federated search as it now exists seems at odds with our mission to teach academic research skills tailored to specific situations and inquiries, using the full breadth of our resources. We will look forward to new federated search products with anticipation, especially if they meet our criteria of completeness and have added-value in their presentation.

New Resource Credo Reference is a Great Place to Start Your Research

The library is now subscribed to Credo Reference, the premier Reference database on the market. This is a great place to start your research. Here is the title list. It includes concept maps and an image search in addition to the usual encyclopedias, dictionaries, biographies, quotations, bilingual dictionaries, and measurement conversions. There are also connections which allow you to jump to some of our other database subscriptions once you're ready to do more in depth research. From their Website:

“Credo Reference is a full-text online reference service. Our collection includes over three million entries from hundreds of well-regarded titles from some of world’s the best reference publishers. Credo’s collection is intelligently integrated with millions of cross-references and contains dictionaries, bilingual dictionaries, thesauri, encyclopedias, quotations and atlases, plus a wide range of subject-specific titles covering everything from art to accountancy, science to Shakespeare and law to literature.”

Enter at the URL: http://www.credoreference.com.ezproxy.csp.edu/

Free Books Available Until Feb 19th

The library has some free books available on the first 2 columns of the first shelf of books facing you as you walk into the library. If you want a shot at them, get them before 5:00 PM on Friday, February 19th, which is the last day they will be available.

New Policy for Group Study Rooms: Sign Up @ the Reference Desk

Due to high demand for study rooms, a new policy will take effect on Monday, November  23rd. This new policy's purpose is a fairer distribution of study room time among a greater number of users. The new policy entails:

• - You now must sign up to use the 4 person study rooms.


• - To sign up, stop at the Reference Desk. You will be asked for ID. If you are a Concordia student, make sure to show your Concordia ID instead of your government-issued ID.


• - Priority for the rooms will go to Concordia students. Check at the Ref Desk for the next available room.


• - You can sign up for 2 hours at a time per group.


• - Minimum group size is 2/Maximum group size is 4.


• - You can still reserve the rooms in advance; now this can be done at the Reference Desk.

We hope this will encourage people who have given up hope of getting access to a study room to give it another try.

Free Books!

The library has a few shelves of extra books to give away for free. You can find them right through the entrance and a little to your right, on the first shelving unit facing the Pearson Commons.

Look at Our New Trial: AP Images

From the AP Images Website:

"AP Images, a division of The Associated Press, is one of the world's largest collections of historical and contemporary imagery. Browse AP's comprehensive archive with millions of images in entertainment, sports, news, archival and creative content.

AP Images collaborates with content and global image partners, offering immediate access to more than 6 million entertainment, sports, news and lifestyle photographs."

To give it a try, follow this link. Then call or email the CSP Reference Desk for a username and password: (651) 641-8812 | reference@csp.edu