Feedback from Library Instruction Interviews

Today I conducted an instruction meeting with the librarian at Idaho State University's Eli M. Oboler Library and reported back to them on the feedback I had received after conducting interviews with each of them. Librarians at ISU are required to teach a certain number of hours in our instruction program. As the Coordinator of Instruction, I want to help them provide quality instruction.

Take a look at some of the ideas they suggested for improvement. Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Feedback from Library Instruction Interviews

View more documents from Spencer Jardine.

Maps: How People are Finding Them These Days

For the most recent bathroom newsletter, I wrote the following blurb:

If you are traveling or hiking this summer, you might consider using some of the maps or atlases available in the Oboler Library. The map collection on the third floor contains many topographic maps of the intermountain region. They can be checked out for one week at a time. Road atlases, solar system, galaxy, and star atlases, as well as lunar maps can be found and taken on night watches of the sky. Look for other kinds of maps and atlases in our catalog, some of the best reside in the Atlas Stand (1st Floor), Oversized, and Reference Collection.

In the brief time I have been a librarian, I have noticed that the maps in our map collection do not get used much. Other librarians say that they used to be checked out and looked at a lot more. I suspect that with the online availability of maps, this has changed things quite a bit. People no longer need to consult physical atlases when they can go to mapquest.com or Google Maps to print out directions for a trip.

Still, it seems that people doing any kind of field research that requires knowledge of the terrain could benefit from topographic maps. (For a good definition, take a look at What is a topographic map?.) Maybe they go directly to the U.S. Geological Survey to view these kinds of maps. By the way, they also have aerial photos available on their website. Many of these topographic and aerial maps can be bought, printed, or downloaded from their Maps, Imagery, and Publications page.

As a member of the Federal Depository Library Program, the Eli M. Oboler Library houses many government documents, including maps that are freely available to the public. The biggest drawback is making it to the physical library, but every citizen of Idaho can check out whatever they want as long as they show some government-issued form of identification. All who enter the Library can look at anything they want in the government-documents section on the third floor.

This seems to be the key change, many people can look at maps online, without having to make a trip to the library. However, if individuals want to save money, they can still come and check out our maps for free, versus the purchase options on the U.S. Geological Survey site. Then again, the U.S. Geological Survey does have some pretty cool maps, like this earthquake map that shows where the largest earthquakes have struck over a hundred-year period. At a glance, it looks to me like Africa, Europe, and the eastern coasts of the Americas are safe from most earthquakes.

Changes to MLA Handbook

One of the biggest changes to the MLA citation style is that they are asking that each reference identify its medium. In the past, the default medium was print, so as long as it was print, you did not have to say that. With technological advancements, that has all changed. Take a look at the MLA page that discusses this change among others.

For citation examples incorporating some of these changes, take a look at some of the following pages:
1. Scottsdale Community College Citation Guide.
2. The OWL at Purdue: MLA Update 2009
3. Duke University Libraries: Assembling a List of Works Cited in Your Paper
4. Dixie State College of Utah: How to Cite BOOKS, eBOOKS, and CHAPTERS
5. Gabriele Library, Immaculata University: MLA Style: This pdf document includes a good list of sample citations beginning on page three (there are 11 pages total).
6. How to Cite Media, Video, and Online Media

Look at this tutorial for explanations and practice:
1. MLA Tutorial

For similar lists of websites, take a look at my MLA bookmarks within my Delicious account. When you see a number in blue to the right of a website, you can click on it to see all the other people who have "tagged" that website, then you can see all the websites they have tagged with that tag, so you can see other sites with 'mla' as the tag.

Unfortunately, one of my favorite sites with MLA examples still has not updated their page. Long Island University's Schwartz Memorial Library has an MLA Citation Style page which color codes the different elements of the citation. They have updated their examples in accordance with changes outlined in the 7th edition.

Another reader found the following website to be useful when looking to learn more about citing sources: The Ultimate Guide to Citation Style by the business-training-schools.com

Keeping Up on the Professional Literature

Professionals in any field tend to do better if they keep up on the professional literature. This kind of blanket generalization is certainly fodder for debate, but when supervisors and administrators higher up the chain talk about how the professionals ought to be keeping up on their field's research it means it ought to be done.

Unfortunately, with so many projects it can be difficult to keep up, so it's important to develop strategies. If you work in a library where they route your favorite periodicals to your desk, it may not be a bad idea to develop some strategies like looking at the table of contents and deciding which, if any, of the articles you have time to read, which are worth reading in other words.

Academic librarians would do well to keep an eye on The Chronicle of Higher Education to keep abreast of the salient issues in academe. Library journals can be quite useful as well. One periodical that I have come to appreciate is Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning. It focuses on issues of teaching, learning, assessment, and academic life in higher education.

For example, in the most recent May/June 2009 issue Michael Fischer writes an article titled "Defending Collegiality." He argues that a code of conduct should be written that advocates civility and collegiality. Starting his article, he references Robert I. Sutton's book The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't. Some might argue that a code of conduct might inhibit free expression or intellectual freedom, but the reality is that those who attack others keep the rest in the group from speaking up:

The individuals Sutton is criticizing--the bullies, jerks, and so on--themselves chill debate through personal attacks, intimidation, and invective. One sign of this is the relief felt when they are away. Instead of disappearing, dissent blossoms, as individuals can now express ideas without fear of vicious recrimination and unfounded attack. (22)

Fischer addresses the negative atmospheres that exist in many academic departments and calls for more collegiality and less political in-fighting. One gets the sense that collegiality would go a long way toward improving the institution as a whole while also fomenting innovation and academic rigor. Fischer concludes:

In my experience, most people treat others in the academic workplace with respect, consideration, and care, conduct code or no conduct code. My intent here has not been to legislate collegiality but to make sure that in those rare instances when enough is enough, when egregious behavior persists and reaches a carefully defined tipping point, faculty members and administrators are in a position to do something about it. (25)

Another article in the same issue is authored by Barbara Ischinger and Jaana Puuka, "Universities for Cities and Regions: Lessons from the OECD Reviews." It talks about the importance of universities to work with their local and regional economies to improve both research and the economy. If a university wants to become a world-class institution it needs to develop this supportive, collaborative environment.

Buried at the back of the issue is an article titled "Books Worth Reading" by Mary Taylor Huber. With a title like this, how could a librarian like myself not be interested? She reviews two books that discuss the ideas of the best books programs. Her discussion of these books prompted me to recommend these titles for purchase by our general collections bibliographer.

Title #1: A Great Idea at the Time: The Rise, Fall, and Curious Afterlife of the Great Books. Alex Beam. New York: Public Affairs Publishing, 2008, 256 pgs, $24.95 hardcover.

Title #2: Racing Odysseus: A College President Becomes a Freshman Again. Roger H. Martin. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008, 280 pgs, $24.95 hardcover.

Recommendation for Article on Library Scavenger Hunts

Since I am working with our First Year Seminar program to develop a library scavenger hunt, I decided to do a little research to see what has been written on the subject. ACRL's information literacy and instruction listserv has archived many of the responses from librarians around the country, but the archive is very unwieldy. When I accessed it I could only search from month to month. The search box would not allow me to search the whole archive. Who knows, perhaps they don't have a server that could accommodate many extensive searchers?

Academic Search Complete yielded a few results, but the most promising article was not available in full text. So I interlibrary loaned it--one of the first times I've used this service since working at ISU. Cheryl McCain wrote a well-balanced article for College & Undergraduate Libraries titled "Scavenger Hunt Assignments in Academic Libraries: Viewpoints versus Reality" (14.1: 2007, 19-32). Many librarians complain about library scavenger hunts, but they do not back up their complaints with any research.

Nearly every librarian knows that a scavenger hunt can be poorly developed; however, McCain's article cites one study that showed how a scavenger hunt actually taught more to students than a library tour. Groups and basic instruction helps in the assignment also increased the scavenger hunt's success. Not much as been written about scavenger hunts in the way of an actual research study, so this could be a great opportunity for an enterprising librarian to conduct such a study. Students and faculty often learn from the scavenger hunt and in the process become more comfortable and familiar with the building and its physical and virtual resources, which or worthy objectives in my book.

What the Best College Teachers Do (A Book Review)

Many librarians in the last ten or fifteen years have found themselves in situations they never dreamed of previously--instruction settings. Generally speaking, individuals who have entered the library profession may have done so in part because they did not want to teach or stand in front of people to give presentations. While this may have been possible 40 to 50 years ago, it no longer holds true. Academic librarians need to learn about teaching issues just as much as their full-time faculty colleagues across campus. Ken Bain's book What the Best College Teachers Do is a great place to start learning about teaching and learning issues, because it explores his findings from a longitudinal study on a large sample of the best college teachers.

First, a good college teacher must be knowledgeable in his/her discipline; however, expert knowledge of one's field does not automatically qualify a person to become a great teacher. He writes: "The people in our study, unlike so many others have used their knowledge to develop techniques for grasping fundamental principles and organizing concepts that others can use to begin building their own understanding and abilities" (16). Certainly, in-depth understandings of a topic can give anyone a great deal of confidence, but the best teachers actively seek for ways in which they can lead others to similar understandings.

Great teachers do not want to create a pandemonium of parrots. No, they honestly want to influence students to become lifelong learners who passionately explore the big questions of life. Bain says: "While others, for example, talk about transmitting knowledge and building a storehouse of information in the students' brains, our subjects talk about helping learners grapple with ideas and information to construct their understanding" (16). Teaching is not an easy thing to do, but Bain asserts that people can learn how to become better teachers. In fact, that is the main purpose of his book: "Most of all, I hope readers will take away from this book the conviction that good teaching can be learned" (21).

This book challenges the idea that someone is either born a good teacher or they are not. For inexperienced and experienced teachers alike, it can be temptingly easy to fault the students when a class does not go well. Student attitudes and preparations can make a huge difference, but Bain claims that the best college teacher "didn't blame their students for any of the difficulties they faced" (19). Instead they tended to examine what had happened and then modify their approach to achieve better results.

The seven chapters and epilogue focus on key teaching issues:
1. Definitions of the best teachers
2. What they know about learners and students
3. How they prepare to teach
4. Their expectations of students
5. How they conduct class
6. How they treat students
7. How they evaluate students and themselves
Epilogue: What we can learn from them

I highly recommend that librarians with teaching responsibilities pick up this book and consider how they can use its principles to improve library instruction. Bain writes in a very accessible manner and constantly pulls quotes and anecdotes from interviews while making observations and conclusions throughout the book.

Teachers in all fields of study can begin to do what the best teachers do. Bain concludes: "Excellent teachers develop their abilities through constant self-evaluation, reflection, and the willingness to change" (172).

Information Discoveries and Behavior

Today I heard about a musician I had not heard about before, so I looked first in the Oxford Reference Online resource and found nothing on this particular artist. However, I did find a good little article in the Encyclopedia Britannica on Dan Fogelberg. This led me to discover that I could share the article about Mr. Fogelberg with readers if my blog. I think this is pretty cool that Encyclopedia Britannica allows its readers share useful articles with those who do not have paid subscriptions to their encyclopedia. It makes some sense; if people see the quality articles they are writing, they might be more inclined to pay for a personal subscription themselves.

Also, I googled "Dan Fogelberg" and found a bunch of websites and videos focusing on him. The first result took me to another Google results page that listed all of his albums with links to the record labels where you could no doubt purchase individual tracks or the entire album. Perhaps this should not surprise me, because the internet really does cater to business interests. In other words it's a great place to buy and sell things and find where you can do this, which you probably already knew.

From the second results page I saw something else I had never seen. At the top and bottom of the webpage, the Google search button said "Search Music," and it was placed next to another search button titled "Search Web." These are little things, but it tells me that Google continues to make improvements to its product. They must realize the searchers like to limit their options. If they are searching for music, they don't want medical sites to pop up. Apparently, though, you have to enter your search and select what you want before this limiting function appears. In this case "Dan Fogelberg" was a big enough or unique enough name (though I don't recall having ever heard of him in all my born days before today), so that Google could tell he was a musician. The logic follows that if you want to know more about this musician, maybe you would like to learn more about other musicians.

I wonder how much information behavior has changed because of the Google algorithm. My limited understanding is that it returns results according to their popularity as determined by the number of links pointing to particular webpages. The more sites pointing their hyperlinks to a particular page, the more likely you are to find it by just surfing the internet. Anyway, something to think about.

Yeah, Dan Fogelberg definitely appealed more to the generation that preceded mine. Chances are that I've heard some of his music without learning about him--that he was the artist.

Google Information Behavior

Google Analytics allows people to see how many people are coming to their website, which sites referred them to the site, and which terms they entered in a search engine to find the site. It's interesting and flattering to find out that people from India, Australia, Russia, England, etc. have visited my site before. Of course, the vast majority if individuals viewing my blog come from the United States and Canada.

Don't worry, I have no reason to be cocky as soon as I see how long people stay on any given page. My bounce rate is too high. It does feel good to see which entries get looked at the most and for the longest amount of time. At any rate, looking at this usage data does motivate me to write more posts to my blog. The more blog posts I write, the more that people will likely see my blog

Currently, my blog is up 9.27% over the last month in number of visitors, with 271 visits who averaged one minute twelve seconds (1:12) on my site. In the last month only 9.96% were repeat visitors, indicating that a clear majority found my site via a search engine. Actually, the "Traffic Sources Overview" shows that 8.49% came to my site directly, 15.50% came from referring sites (sites with lists of information-literacy/library blogs), and 76.01% from search engines. Increasing my post frequency and quality would likely increase my number of repeat visitors.

It's particularly interesting to me to see which Google search terms brought individuals to my blog. "College reading strategies" always seems to draw several people to my blog each month. It's often at the top of my most-viewed posts, but not far behind that is my post on the difference between a catalog and an index, though the searchers often use different sorts of terms and combinations of terms to find it. Many have found my site looking for a la carte menus for library instruction. It seems that my most faithful audience out there consists of other librarians, which totally makes sense, considering the subject matter of my posts.

Quite a number of individuals have found my site by conducting various searches on the differences between the Greek gods, Dionysus and Apollo, and their philosophies.

Of the 186 searches that found my site, there were 106 searches that contained more than three words. People understand they can enter lots of words, including prepositions, into a search, and this will often yield the right kinds of results they are seeking.

The person who conducted this search "inblogtitle:"information literacy" university" stayed on my site the longest (26 mins.) and actually viewed 4 different pages. (Thank you, and I hope you come back.) It's probably a librarian or a library-science student. In second place, someone who searched on the following terms: "scholarships and grants reference book," stayed on the site for 20 minutes and visited two pages. Third place goes to the information seeker who used these keywords: "craap test worksheet activity quiz" with a time of 7:28.

Particularly for librarians, it is interesting to think about the information behavior and practice of different individuals, which reminds me that I need to go back and look at that post to remember what the difference is between information behavior and information practice.

Thank you for visiting my blog. : ) Please comment and let me know what you think.

Knowing How to Find Information

Information-literacy skills will help individuals recognize when they need information, where they might go for information, how to find it, and how to use it. Today a patron came asking for the salary of department chairs in a California State University. Initially, I thought he was asking for salaries of ISU faculty. (We have two spiral-bound books that list the salaries of all persons working at ISU. By government mandate, all government employees must have their salaries freely available to the public.)

Once I found out he needed salary ranges for engineering chairs in California I went to Google. We found a few results that looked somewhat useful. He asked that I email him a URL, so he could look at it on his own.

After he left I wondered whether or not one of the librarians at this university in California could find the salary ranges that we needed, so I googled the university and found its library. They had a nifty chat-reference service embedded on one of their webpages, which I found to be easy to use. The librarian on the other end thought that this listing of salaries at their institution would be online, but after she/he couldn't find it, they told me they would retrieve the print copy. (When you are waiting for an answer on a chat service, two minutes seems like an eternity. We are spoiled with our quick technology.)

Not too long afterwards, the librarian returned and provided the salary range (they have more than one engineering department, thus they have more than one engineering chair) and a few other bits of information that she/he thought would be useful. Since I had previously emailed the patron, I was able to send along this additional information.

When someone asks for information about a specific institution or locale, it may not hurt to consult a librarian at that institution, or a librarian at the nearest public library.

How can I find a report on reading statistics in the U.S.?

Today a newsletter called Smart Libraries was left in my mailbox. ALA TechSource publishes this newsletter. On the third page, they include an article on the most recent reading report created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which is titled "Reading on the Rise. Basically, they claim that reading has increased in the last few years--not dramatically, but they have been able to measure it to some degree.

Naturally, this is good news. Reading in general, even literary titles like novels, poetry, and plays, tends to result in social benefits. In a previous report NEA completed in 2004, reading had gone down: Reading at Risk Report.

I appreciate that the author of this newsletter article, Tom Peters, inserted statistics on persons who listen to audiobooks, why they do it, and how they are more likely to read a physical book than someone who doesn't listen to an audiobook. Most people find audiobooks at a local library and do so for long trips, exercise, or to reduce monotony on their daily commutes. It appears, though, that downloaded electronic books are becoming more popular. He found many of these statistics via the APA Press Release.

Libraries, of course, promote reading, and librarians should be aware of the different formats in which people "read" and make them as easily accessible as possible.

Information Literacy Article by William Badke

William Badke continues to champion the cause of information literacy. As a prolific author, he addresses many facets of finding, evaluating, interpreting, and using information. Though I have not done so yet, it would be a good idea to read his book Research Strategies: Finding Your Way Through the Information Fog, 3rd. ed., which was published just last year.

I have enjoyed reading his regular "Infolit Land" column in Online: Exploring Technology & Resources for Information Professionals. His Jan/Feb article is titled: "Professors and Personal Information Literacy." In it he describes three different professors he has known (of course he conceals their identity). Professor A comes to him and essentially wants him to do the research for him--a literature review (47). Professor B, on the other hand, copies down search terms and techniques, while not exactly grasping the larger information-literacy strategy. Finally, Badke explains how Professor C brings his students to the Library every semester for instruction, introduces the class, and emphasizes the value of what they've have been taught (48).

Before writing, I had not paid attention to the sections of the article, which shed more light on the character of each professor type here: (a) intermediary dependent, (b) strategy determination, and (c) teachable professor. This article is worth reading.

Badke makes some excellent points, so I'd like to quote him directly:

I've started to wonder if faculty members who are passively resistant to information literacy instruction are guided less by pride than by a lack of belief that information literacy can be taught at all. Most faculty members fell into their own research skills just because they are gifted academically. No one taught them, and they can't even remember learning how to do research. To them, teaching a student how to do research is like teaching critical thinking. Academics are always talking about it, but few have any sort of notion of a pedagogy that could actually bring it about. You learn it by doing it, so how can it be taught. (48)

He says it better than I can. Badke acknowledges that his generalizations do not ring true for every academic in higher education. There are professors who dedicate time to understanding pedagogy and how to really foster critical-thinking skills, but they seem to be in minority. Many academics worry a great deal about covering the content in their courses. Content/knowledge is very important, but understanding how people came to that knowledge is just as important, as is knowing why that knowledge is important and how it impacts other knowledge.

I suppose that if I were to disagree with one thing that Badke says in the last quote, I would take issue with the assertion that "Most faculty members fell into their own research skills just because they are gifted academically. No one taught them, and they can't even remember learning how to do research." In many cases I would think that professors picked up research tips and insights a little bit at a time from a classmate here, a thesis adviser there, an observation they make while combing through footnotes, and sometimes even from a librarian. If it takes a village to raise a child, maybe it takes an invisible college to raise an academic.

On the bright side, it seems that Badke's comments in this article would align well with Ken Bain's ideas in What the Best College Teachers Do; the best college teachers are teachable themselves, make an honest effort to understand their students, and sympathetically invite them to learn--not always relying on just one or two methods.

One other thing that Badke says caught my interest.

But easier search tools do not mean better searches. Abandoning sophistication often means abandoning effective and comprehensive academic research. (49)

Librarians like to hear this sort of thing; it's very vindicating, and it encourages us to go forward in our efforts to convince students of the value of the databases they pay for themselves with their tuition dollars. Taking the time to learn how to search the databases can be very useful, not only for students, but also for faculty.

By the way, I do agree that "easier search tools do not mean better searches."

Tagging Library Catalogs

Would you like to make a comment on a book, video, or other item in your library's catalog? Do you wish to see user-generated keywords/tags next to a bibliographic record in a catalog? If given the choice, would you write a book review for a book in your library? Some libraries have already begun to explore options that allow users do some of these things that can already be done on Amazon. These kinds of catalogs would be called SOPACS, or social online public access catalogs.

Library Hi Tech published an artitle titled "Subjecting the catalog to tagging" by Luiz H. Mendes, Jennie Quinonez-Skinner, and Danielle Skaggs. They talk about a study they conducted on their library's implementation of LibraryThing tags into their catalog. LibraryThing allows its users to catalog their own personal book collections and assign their own personal subject headings, which they call tags. When a user adds a book to their account, they can describe that book with descriptors. Whenever they login to their account, they can click on any of these descriptors to find all the books listed under that heading.

The authors of this article hail from California State University, Northridge, and their library, the Oviatt Library, has pulled these user-generated tags from LibraryThing, using the ISBN numbers. In their discussion section, they claim: "For every new book a user discovers using LCSH headings they will discover four books using LTFL [LibraryThing for Libraries = user-generated tags]. This type of data captures sheer numbers, with the potential for increased resource discovery" (39). They recognize that this does not equate directly to relevancy, but it certainly seems like a step in a positive direction for social OPACs.

I like the idea of having people select user-generated tags, because these tags often reflect more closely the modern-day language people use. One of the standard examples of out-of-date subject headings in the Library of Congress classification system is "cookery," which is the subject heading for cookbooks and cooking. Library patrons would prefer to find just what they want with "cookbooks," and some tags would help them find more specific results more directly, such as "vegan cookbooks," that a user-generated tag might offer.

Choosing a Career

What do you like? Knowing which subjects you like and do well with can help you know which careers would be suitable for you.
The following site helps answer this question by suggesting school subjects and the careers that align best with those subjects. The site also outlines the basic educational requirements, salary ranges, future outlook of the career, number of such positions in the country, etc.

• What do you like? www.bls.gov/k12

For a larger listing of careers, take a look at the Occupational Outlook
Handbook. It provides some of the same kinds of information, except it offers more details. A listing of jobs can be viewed in alphabetical order or browsed by category.

• Occupational Outlook Handbook: www.bls.gov/OCO

To gauge your interest in various careers, take a questionnaire or look at the
resources on the Career Interest Guide.

• Career Interest Guide
• Career Interest Guide Questionnaire
• Career Interest Area

Look at a few books:

• College Majors Handbook with Real Career Paths and Payoffs : the actual jobs, earnings, and trends for graduates of 60 college majors. Reference Collection (1st Floor). Call Number: HF5382.5.U5 F644 2004.
• The Compleat Academic : A Career Guide. Main Book Collection (2nd Floor). Call Number: H62.C584824 2004.
• Internships : theory and practice / by Charles H. Sides and Ann Mrvica. Main Book Collection (2nd Floor). Call Number: LC1072.I58 S53 2007.
• Vault Guide to Top Internships. Reference Collection (1st Floor). Call Number: LC1072.I58 V38 2004.

3 Things to Consider

1. Will it support you and your [future] household?
2. Is it something that interests you? Would you enjoy the work in that field?
3. Will there be demand for this career, or job path? Is there a demand right now?


Need to talk with someone?

Visit ISU’s Academic Advising Center: www.isu.edu/advising
Administration Building - 3rd Floor, Room 316

Job Search Websites

Job Search Websites

Many of these popular job-search websites will allow you to create a free profile, where you can upload your resume and search for job openings. You can search by location or by job title.

1. Monster.com
2. Usajobs.opm.gov
3. Careerbuilder.com
4. Collegerecruiter.com: claims to help students find internships and entry-level jobs for recent graduates.
5. Hotjobs.yahoo.com
6. Labor.idaho.gov: Idaho Department of Labor website. Search for jobs and find recommendations for effective job searches.
7. Career.com
8. Job.com
9. Indeed.com
10. Jobcentral.com

Websites with Tips and Suggestions

1. PriceWaterhouseCoopers: "10 Tips to Recession-Proof Your Job Search" by Lindsey Pollack.
2. Rileyguide.com
a. How to Job Search
b. Before You Search
c. Sites with Job Listings
d. Resumes & Cover Letters
e. Salary Guides
3. Truecareers.com
a. Resume Help
b. Resume Writing
4. Usajobs.opm.gov
a. Student Jobs: www.studentjobs.gov.
b. Government Jobs
c. Career Exploration
d. Career Interest Guide
e. Career Interest Guide Questionnaire
f. Career Interest Areas
5. Careeronestop.org
a. Explore Careers
b. Salary and Benefits
c. Education and Training
d. Job Search
e. Resumes and Interviews
f. People and Places to Help

Other Websites

1. ISU Career Center: Find out their hours, so you can go talk to the experts. Learn how to find and prepare for internships and job opportunities. Develop interviewing skills. Search for jobs here at ISU.
2. Company websites: if you know where you want to work, try looking at well-known companies in that area to see if they have any interesting and relevant job openings. A typical search engine will help you find most company websites.
3. Industry, Trade, or Professional Associations: membership allows you access to their job-searching engines. Exs: American Engineering Association, American Bankers Association, and Chronicle of Higher Education (see their Careers section).
4. Delicious.com/sjardine/jobs. Find bookmarked websites, including the ones listed here and blogs that list even more.

Information in this post was presented during a workshop on job searching in the Eli M. Oboler Library on April 15, 2009.

LexisNexis Academic = Great for Finding Court Cases

One of our most versatile resources, this database provides access to scholarly research, newspaper articles, business data, and legal materials. It allows its users to search the archives of specific newspapers or journals, including the local paper like the Post Register and national ones like The New York Times. The legal tab provides options for searching tax law, federal and state cases, Shepard’s Citations, as well as federal and state laws (the database uses the word “code” here). In the business tab you can search for company-specific information: its history, current value of their stocks, names of its executives, contact information, and more. For help with this resource, talk to the librarians at the reference desk.

I just helped a student today find some Idaho case called State v. Guzman, which he knew had taken place in 1992. Under the Legal tab, LexisNexis allows you to input case names by providing two empty search boxes with a "v." between them. When we searched for "State v. Guzman" there were about 200 results that turned up, and we even had specified "Idaho" as a source or option. When he keyed "Idaho State v. Guzman," we found it right away.

LexisNexis Academic seems to be a lot more user friendly than it used to be a few years ago, but many still consider it to be user unfriendly. The way they display the results it not useful--the typeface does not make it easy to separate the different elements of the result. It can still be a very powerful database, though.