CQ Researcher: Global Food Crisis

Food prices have spiked around the world over the past year, bringing hunger and unrest to many developing countries, along with pain at the checkout counter for lower-income American families. In North Korea, for example, where 35 percent of the population is undernourished, the price of the major food staple, rice, soared 186 percent, and overall food prices rose 70 percent. With 2.1 billion people around the world living on less than $2 a day, such price increases may plunge hundreds of millions into malnutrition and starvation. Drought, high oil prices that make food transport pricey and diversion of corn for use as a biofuel all contribute to the price spike. The effect of globalization — which has led poor countries to abandon domestic food crops in favor of commodity crops for export — also has been blamed. The crisis also has sparked international tension over the impact of wealthy nations' farm subsidies and meat-heavy diets, which take many more resources to produce than grain- or legume-based diets. Read the entire report. (password protected)
Source: Introduction to report in CQ Researcher

New Feature: Digital Collections

The Internet is often the first and sometimes only research resource for scholars and educators, but many open-access digital image collections are part of the deep Web, keeping important visual content out of a search engine’s reach. In recent years, libraries, archives, and historical societies across the United States have created rich online visual resource collections that include a wealth of subjects and media formats. Researchers now have access to millions of primary materials from any Internet-accessible computer, which would otherwise require an in-person visit to the physical collection. Each week this blog will let you know about one of these collections. This week it is right here in Connecticut--Yale University.
Yale University Library Digital Collections. More than 100,000 digital images are accessible through the homepage for the Yale University Library Digital Collections. Although some subscription databases are not accessible to the public, content belonging to the collections at Yale University is searchable and viewable by the public. Visitors to the site may search for images across featured collections by using the basic or advanced search options, or they may browse collections by name, topic, medium, or by the owning repository, which include the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library, and the Law Library.(Before I came to Goodwin College, I did some work with the digital collection of the Cushing/Whitney Medical Historical Library.)
Click here for Yale University Digital Collections

One-Stop Shopping for Composition Instructors: Compile

This summer, The National Council for the Teachers of English (NCTE) is exploring a variety of Web sites and tools that teachers can use in the classroom and/or for their professional development. This week, NCTE explains why writing teachers at the college level should know about Compile.

So what is it? Compile is a database of 94956 records that catalog books, journal articles, and other publications in composition, rhetoric, technical writing, ESL, and discourse studies. The collection has a full range of search capabilities.

The purpose of Compile is to allow ready reference to the published twentieth-century work in post-secondary composition and rhetoric, from the beginning of WWII to the end of the century. It does not extend before 1939 or after 1999. It is an on-line, keyworded, searchable inventory for researchers and teachers and anybody else interested. Compile is offered in the spirit of free research and scholarship. (Use of this bibliography for profit, however, requires permission.)

CompPile's focus is on post-secondary writing. It integrates journal articles, review-essays, notes and comments, books, dissertations, ERIC items, and edited collections. It does not systematically cover textbooks, how-to books, conference notices, editor's forwards, or reviews of single works.
Source: NCTE

Is This a Mistake?

USA Today reports that in the past two years, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia and Oklahoma have refused in-state tuition benefits to students who entered the USA illegally with their parents but grew up and went to school in the state. That represents a reversal from earlier this decade, when 10 states passed laws allowing in-state rates for such students. Is this a mistake?

This is definitely a mistake, according to Fareed Zakaria who writes in Foreign Affairs that "the United States' potential advantages today are in large part a product of immigration. Foreign students and immigrants account for 50% of the science researchers in the country and in 2006 received 40% of the doctorates in science and engineering and 65% of the doctorates in computer science.... In short, the United States potential new burst of productivity,its edge in nanotechnology and biotechnology, its ability to invent the future--all rest on its immigration policies. If the United States can keep the people it educates in the country, the innovation will happen here." This essay is adapted from his book, The Post-American World. --currently on the New York Times best seller list.
Source of the quote: Foreign Affairs May/June 2008

Time Magazine Features Mark Twain

"Mark Twain has been called the inventor of the American novel. It might even be fair to call him the inventor of the American short story. And he surely deserves an additional encomium: the man who popularized the sophisticated literary attack on racism," according to Stephen Carter in his Time magazine cover story about Mark Twain this week. You must read this article, "Getting Past Black and White."
Source: Time Magazine

Evaluating Online Learning

The U.S. Department of Education last week released its first guide to the evaluation of online-learning programs in K-12 education. The report is designed to help school leaders gauge the effectiveness of online education, as its use grows rapidly across the United States.

“While online-learning programs that deliver courses have been around for about a decade, this report is the first to fully address the issues in evaluating online programs in K-12 education,” said Susan D. Patrick, the president and chief executive officer of the North American Council for Online Learning, or NACOL, which released its own standards for online programs earlier this year. Voluntary Online-Teaching Standards Come Amid Concerns Over Quality.
Source: Educaton Week July 8 2008

Community Guide to Environmental Health

Drawing the connections between people’s health and the environments in which we live, this groundbreaking book empowers health promoters, development workers, educators, activists, community leaders and ordinary people to take charge of their communities’ health.
…
Years in the making, this comprehensive guide has twenty-three chapters which break down the broad overview of environmental issues and concerns into specific examples of how they affect peoples’ health, and how communities have organized to improve their environment and thus their own lives. These chapters include: Promoting Environmental Health; Environmental Rights and Justice; Protecting Community Water; Building Toilets; Mining and Health; Solid Waste: Turning a Health Risk into a Resource; Preventing and Reducing Harm from Toxics; Sustainable Farming; Restoring Land and Planting Trees, The False Promise of Genetically-Engineered Foods; and Clean Energy.

Eighty-two specific stories from communities around the world enliven the chapters, showing the environmental challenges faced, and what people and grassroots organizations have done to empower themselves and transform their communities. The book also includes 22 activities and 40 easy-to-build “how-to” projects.
Source: Hesperian Foundation

What Americans Know

The Newsweek Poll gauges what Americans know on a broad range of topics from the price of oil to the works of Shakespeare. A few of the results:
77% don't know who the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court is (answer: John Robers)
32% think that the popular vote determines the outcome if a presidential election ends in an Electoral College tie (Answer: US. House of Representatives breaks the tie)
67% know that a barrel of oil costs about $140 on the world market today.
80% know that TV broadcasts in the United States are scheduled to switch from analog to digital in 2009.
20% know that Sunnis are the largest group of muslims worldwide.
for the complete poll results, go to xtra.Newsweek.com

College-Educated Women Keep Working

Opting-Out Trend Doesn't Square With Census Data. There have been a number of high-profile articles about well- educated women "opting out" of the work force after having children. But a new study published in the June issue of the "American Sociological Review" says that this so-called opting-out revolution has been overblown.

Among the findings: Fewer than 8% of professional, college-educated women born since 1956 leave the work force for a year or more during their prime childbearing years, writes sociologist Christine Percheski, a doctoral student at Princeton, in an examination of census data. What's more, full-time employment levels of women with young children have risen dramatically in recent decades. And more women with young children are working longer hours.
Source: Wall Street Journal July 1 2008

Reading First Program Not Funded

The full Senate Appropriations Committee last week approved a fiscal 2009 spending measure that would eliminate funding for the Reading First program, while providing modest increases for other programs serving disadvantaged students and those in special education. See the full article in Education Week.
Source: Education Week June 27 2008

Virtual Library Day on the Hill

Today is Virtual Library Day on the Hill!We are looking for library advocates from across the country to call attention to the value of today’s libraries, as well as the issues the library community is facing. This is especially important in an election year, as many of our nation’s legislators will be looking to hear from their constituents. This is our chance to make the library voice heard!

Virtual Library Day on the Hill is an amazing opportunity to showcase the value and importance of libraries to Members of Congress and let them know how important federal funding is to our nation’s libraries. Go to www.capwiz.com/ala to write your Members of Congress about the importance of libraries.

Top 10 Most Re-Read Books List

Listed below is the Top 10 Most Re-Read Books List created in July 2004 byThe American Library Association's panel:

J.R.R. Tolkien - The Lord of the Rings

Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol

Harper Lee - To Kill a Mockingbird

Shakespeare's collected works

F. Scott Fitzgerald – The Great Gatsby

Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice

J.K. Rowling - Harry Potter series

Laura Ingalls Wilder - Little House on the Prairie series

A.A. Milne - Winnie the Pooh

Alice Walker - The Color Purple

Alt Healthwatch Database--free trial

The library has a free trial of this database that focuses on the many perspectives of complementary, holistic and integrated approaches to health care and wellness. It offers libraries full text articles for more than 180 international, and often peer-reviewed journals and reports. In addition, there are hundreds of pamphlets, booklets, special reports, original research and book excerpts.

Full text titles include American Journal of Chinese Medicine, American Journal of Homeopathic Medicine, California Journal of Oriental Medicine, European Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms, Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine, Journal of Asian Natural Products Research, Journal of the Australian Traditional-Medicine Society, Journal of the Canadian Chiropractic Association and many others. Alt HealthWatch provides in-depth coverage across the full spectrum of subject areas covered by complementary and alternative medicine. Contact the library for access information.

Avoid High Price of Textbooks--Rent Them

With a college textbook often costing more than $100, it’s no wonder that students are protesting, and Congress has discussed legislation to lower the price of textbooks.

But what if students rented books instead of buying them? That’s the business model behind a company called Chegg, which was started a year ago and bills itself as “the Netflix for college textbooks.” Students identify the books they want to rent and place their order online. Then, Chegg ships the books to students’ residences. After using the books for a semester, students mail the books back to Chegg with prepaid shipping labels that they download from the Chegg Web site. Chegg literature says its rental model can save students 60 percent to 80 percent off the price of a book.
Source: Chronicle's Community College Newsletter July 1 2008

IT Business Hiring Strong

If error messages and bundles of wire get you enthusiastic, you're in luck, as the IT field continues to boast the greatest hiring demand, according to a nationwide CareerBuilder.com survey.

Nearly 40 percent of IT employers are looking to add full-time, permanent employees in the third quarter. But IT isn't the only burgeoning field.
Source: Hartford Business Journal July 1 2008

Is Google Making us Stupid?

What is the Internet doinig to our brain?
Remember in 2001: A Space Odyssey where the astronaut was coldy disconnecting the memory circuits as Hal pleads "Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it." Is that what the Internet is doing to our brains? In the article in the Atlantic, author Nicholas Carr writes that "media supplies the stuff of thought, but they also shape the process of thought. And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski." For those of us who spend much time with the Internet medium, this article is definitely required reading.
Source: "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" Atlantic July/August 2008

Science Animations; Interactive Tutorials

This site makes it so much fun to understand scientific theories and phenomena, including plant life cycles, plate tectonics, bacterial growth, severe weather, how lasers works, and much more. It even has microbiology, Anatomy and physiology I & II, biology, ecology, geology, physics, and lots of general collections. The NASA simulations and downloadable multimedia from Penn State are awesome.

Science Animations: Movies and Interactive Tutorial Links

New Database: Campus Research

The Connecticut Digital Library (ICONN) is discontinuing access to LexisNexis Academic July 1 and replacing it with Thopmson's Campus Research. Campus Research is a comprehensive collection of news, business and law-related information for students--organized and packaged with timesaving tools and an easy-to-use interface. It offers full-text information on a wide range of academic disciplines – information that can't easily be found on the Internet or any other readily available source. Remember to try it out on July 1 and frequently after that.

You Get:
Thousands of news databases arranged geographically and topically
Hundreds of newspapers, newswires, magazines, and broadcast transcripts
Business, trade, and professional journals such as Financial Times and New England Journal of Medicine
More than 800 law reviews and journals, including Harvard Law Review and Yale Law Journal
Federal and state caselaw, including cases from the U.S. Supreme Court
The full text of the United States Code Annotated (USCA) and Code of Federal Regulations (CFR)

Instruction on use of the database is available for anyone in the Goodwin community.

Free Chemistry Audio Shows

Every other month the Nature journals are publishing a FREE audio show, 'ChemPod', specifically for the chemistry community, from interviews with Nobel Prize winners, to discussions on nanotechnology research and much, much more...

The shows feature important research from the Nature journals as well as interviews with the people behind the science, in-depth commentary, location reports and analysis from journalists covering chemistry around the world.

2008 podcasts
March/April 2008: Audio (mp3 file)

In this episode of Chempod, we get caught up in catalysis, discover drawbacks to some Alzheimer's drug candidates, and bring you a round up of the best of the American Chemical Society meeting in New Orleans.

January/February 2008: Audio (mp3 file)

In this show, we find out how DNA is helping researches build crystals out of nanoparticles, discover a clever chemical trick for manipulating uranium, explore the controversial field of DNA conductivity and talk to chemist Bruce Gibb about re-building life and lab after hurricane Katrina.

Go to Chempod
To download a show to your computer, right click the Audio link and select 'Save target as/Save link as' and save the file to your computer or a CD.

Source: Nature

Entrepreneurship: Not Just for Business Majors

Entrepreneurship is one of the fastest growing subjects in the undergraduate curricula, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education this week. Entreprenuerial ingenuity and risk-taking may seem like traits that can't be taught, but colleges are attempting to do just that--and in nontraditional contexts. More than 2,000 colleges are now offering some sort of entrepreneurship course. The artcle is highly recommended and essential reading for members of the curriculum and standards committees.
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education June 20 2008

Case Against Assessment Tests

250 presidents, senior administrators, faculty leaders, and trustees gathered last week for The Chronicle of Higher Education's Executive Leadership Forum. What seems to worry these campus officials the most is proving the value of college to students, parents, and politicians at a time of rising tuition and tightening credit. In recent years, spurred in large part by Education Secretary Margaret Spellings's National Commission on the Future of Higher Education, some people have called for a better measure: assessment tests.

Higher-education leaders have railed against such one-size-fits-all efforts, and those at the Chronicle forum heard perhaps one of the strongest arguments against a test from the opening speaker, Daniel H. Pink, best-selling author of A Whole New Mind. Read the whole article in the Chronicle at the library or request an email copy from the librarian.
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education June 20 2008

Homeland Security Critical Releases

Critical Releases in Homeland Security [June 2008]
Every two weeks, the Homeland Security Digital Library identifies "Critical Releases in Homeland Security," a targeted collection of recently-released documents that are expected to influence homeland security policy & strategy development.

Report on Whether Public Statements Regarding Iraq by U.S. Government Officials Were Substantiated by Intelligence Information, Together with Additional and Minority Views
United States. Congress. Senate. Select Committee on Intelligence

National Response Framework: FEMA Needs Policies and Procedures to Better Integrate Non-Federal Stakeholders in the Revision Process
United States. Government Accountability Office

Maritime Dimension of International Security: Terrorism, Piracy, and Challenges for the United States
RAND Corporation

Intelligence Community Legal Reference Book [U]
United States. Office of the Director of National Intelligence

Homeland Security Presidential Directive 24: Biometrics for Identification of Screening to Enhance National Security [June 5, 2008]
United States. White House Office
Source: Homeland Security Digital Library

Psychology Resources: PsycINFO & PsycARTICLES

PsycINFO gives members of the Goodwin community access to a critical mass of over 2.5 million abstracts of worldwide behavioral literature. From the historical perspective to cutting-edge research, the PsycINFO database is the largest resource devoted to peer-reviewed literature in behavioral science and mental health. Quickly find abstracts of specific types of documents such as journal articles, book chapters, book reviews, editorials, and research methodologies (such as clinical case reports, empirical studies, and literature reviews.

PsycARTICLEs is the largest full-text database of psychology journals. This databse provides student researchers with full-text access to the complete collection of peer-reviewed journals from the leading publisher in psychology,the American Psychological Association (APA). PsycARTICLEs contains more than 124,000 articles from APA-published content from 1894 to present. These are subscription databases available to Goodwin students on and off campus.

Fuel Economy Information

Since Connecticut has the highest gas prices in the country, we all could use some help with fuel economy. The federal government has stepped in with information on your car's gas mileage and energy impact rating.

The site

also tells you where to find the lowest gasoline prices, and even tips on improving your mileage.

source: Environmental Protection Agency

iTunes University: Global Perspective

Welcome to iTunes U.
Higher education has gone high tech. Thanks to iTunes U, professors can post lectures, discussions, and videos of classes on the school’s iTunes U site. Students can download them and put them on their iPods. Then they can learn wherever they are, whenever they want — all free of charge.

If Goodwin college doesn’t yet post content to iTunes U, no problem. Students can access free content from dozens of universities around the world, with topics on everything from business to science to law. At last count, there were more than 60,000 educational audio and video files available. Whether on or off campus, now college comes to you.
Source: Campus Technology June 4 2008

Locating E-resources in the Goodwin Library

The Goodwin Library has over 38,000 electronic periodicals--magazines, newspapers, journals. So how on earth do you find them? Very easy!On the library page, the "Finding Articles-Databases" is the EBSCO A to Z locator tool that now links to the Goodwin College academic databases with digitized peer-reviewed articles on a huge variety of topics. At this site, you can go directly to a database to search or you can choose to search in a particular journal or magazine or you can find journals or magazines by subject. You can use the list to see if the library has a specific source. This is incredibly easy to use. Please try it out.

National Trails Day June 7

Looking for a free and healthy weekend activity? Well,Saturday is National Trails and there are more than 130 guided hikes and outings scheduled in Connecticut. Trail Days events in Connecticut are coordinated by the Connecticut Forest and Park Association (CFPA). Trails Day is a nationwide celebration that brings awareness to trails and the many joys and benefits they provide. Organizations participating in our state include the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC), the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), local and regional land trusts, town agencies,and outdoor-minded businesses. Brochures are available from the CFPA . You can download a complete Trails Day 2008 brochure. Connecticut is a beautiful state. Go out and enjoy it this weekend. Get in shape for the Goodwin hiking club outing later this month.

Source: Connecticut Forest and Park Association

Van Gogh Free Exhibit at Yale Art Gallery

The Yale University Art Gallery is exhibiting two of Vincent Van Gogh's most renowned paintings, Cypresses and Starry Night, side by side for the first time. Together, the paintings reveal the artist's vivid and tender vision of Saint-Remy as he observed the French countryside from his window--by day through the night. Exhibit runs from June 15-September 7.
Source: Yale Art Gallery

Ed-tech Success Story

Since the early 1990s, Maine has been at the forefront of educational innovation, thanks largely to the adoption of new standards--called the Maine Learning Results--as a driver for 21st-century teaching and learning. A critical outcome and guiding principle of these standards is to graduate all students from Maine high schools to be clear and effective communicators. Read this fascinating article about Maine's success story: "Maine writes a new ed-tech success story".

Source: eSchool News June 2, 2008

Women's Rights

Are violence and discrimination against women declining?

Women around the world have made significant gains in the past decade, but tens of millions still face significant and often appalling hardship. Most governments now have gender-equality commissions, electoral gender quotas and laws to protect women against violence. But progress has been mixed. A record number of women now serve in parliaments, but only 14 of the world's 193 countries currently have elected female leaders. Globalization has produced more jobs for women, but they still constitute 70 percent of the world's poorest inhabitants and 64 percent of the illiterate. Spousal abuse, female infanticide, genital mutilation, forced abortions, bride-burnings, acid attacks and sexual slavery remain pervasive in some countries, and rape and sexual mutilation have reached epic proportions in the war-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo. Experts say without greater economic, political and educational equality, the plight of women will not improve, and society will continue suffering the consequences. The full report is available online from CQ Global Researcher

Source: CQ Global Researcher May 30, 2008

Free Business Plans: Bplans.com

Bplans.com contains the largest single collection of free sample business plans online. In addition to that, it has helpful tools and know-how for managing a business. Bplans.com includes practical advice on planning, interactive tools, and a panel of experts who have answered more than 1,400 questions from people like our students.

Warning to Colleges from Accreditors

If colleges want to avoid onerous and ham-handed forms of government regulation, they should become much smarter about analyzing and responding to their own internal student-achievement data. That, in a nutshell, is the message that six representatives of major regional accrediting organizations delivered during a panel discussion Monday at the annual conference of the Association for Institutional Research.

The accreditors told the assembled scholars that they have a responsibility to persuade their deans and faculty colleagues of the importance of using internal data to improve student learning.

Several of the panelists emphasized that their accrediting organizations would continue to respect colleges' distinctive missions. But colleges must be candid with the public about how they measure their success, the accreditors warned, or risk inviting government regulation that is not so respectful of colleges' individual identities. Read the entire article in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Source: Chronicle of Higher Education May 27, 2008

EPA Libraries Re-open in Tiny Spaces

Closed Environmental Protection Agency libraries return in shamefully small spaces. Political appointee assert control over all libraries.

Ordered by Congress to re-open its shuttered libraries, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is grudgingly allocating only minimal space and resources, according to agency documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). At the same time, EPA is issuing a series of edicts placing virtually every aspect of library operations under centralized control of a political appointee.

In a May 8, 2008 e-mail to EPA employee unions, the agency announced its plan for re-opening four of the closed libraries effective September 1. The unions were given until May 22 to reply or object. The announced plan for the Chicago library, for example, formerly the largest regional library serving the entire six-state Great Lakes area, stipulates:

The re-opened library will be in a vacant reception area on the 16th floor of a federal building;
The re-opened library will occupy less than one-tenth the area of the closed library and will be only slightly larger than the typical men’s restroom in that same building; and
No provision is made to restore the unique Great Lakes ecological collection or to recover any of the other holdings from the former library.

Source: Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)

Facebook-based Alumni Connections

Harris Connect has launched a new alumni and student relations tool built on the Facebook Platform. Dubbed "Community Connections," the application is designed to provide secure connections between schools and their Facebook-using constituents and keep them engaged with news and other information.

Read More!

Some New Books

Now or coming soon to Goodwin Library:

Skinny Bitch by Freedman and Barnouin
Our Iceberg is Melting by John Kotter
Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
Armageddon in Retrospect by Kurt Vonnegut
Audition by Barbara Walters
Oxymorons: The Mytth of the U. S. Health Care System by J. D. Kleinke
New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose by Eckhart Tolle (Oprah's Book Club)
Curious You: On Your Way by H. A. Roy
Flipping Brilliant: A Penguin's Guide to a Happy Life by Chester & Regan
Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
Just War: The Just War Tradition: Ethics in Modern Welfare by Guthrie & Quinlan

Basics of Investing

Smart Money University teaches the basics of investing - stocks, bonds, mutual funds, taxes, asset allocation, building portfolios, choosing a broker, and more. It includes a glossary of financial terms, and worksheets to help business students and others assess current finances and plan for the future.
Source: Smart Money Magazine online

Global Perspective with British Podcasts

The British newspaper, The Guardian, provides audio articles in a wide range of categories that will give our students an international perspective on current events. They may search or browse audios by categories. RSS feeds are available for the 13 subject-specific weekly podcasts.
Source: Marylaine Block, Librarian

Learn About Learning Communities

The reort on learning communities published by the National Center for Postsecondary Research has implications for Goodwin College as well as community colleges. As we know,community colleges have taken great strides in recent decades in providing access to college for millions of students with diverse ethnic and academic backgrounds. Now, however, community colleges and private colleges must tackle an even more formidable challenge: how to help increasingly large numbers of academically underprepared students succeed in college. The developmental courses to which over half of entering students are directed often prove to be too great a hurdle, and the majority who hope to earn a certificate or a degree, or to transfer, drop out before reaching their goals.

Learning communities are a popular strategy that community colleges nationwide have embraced in support of developmental students. In a learning community, a cohort of students takes two or more courses linked by integrated themes and assignments that are developed through ongoing faculty collaboration. Learning communities are intended to foster active and collaborative learning and to create stronger relationships among students and between students and faculty. These elements are theorized to increase students’ motivation and sense of belonging, which in turn drive their effort, learning, persistence, and, ultimately, success.

Read the whole report.

Health Information Technology: Costs and Benefits

Many people believe that health information technology (health IT) has the potential to transform the practice of health care by reducing costs and improving quality. The Government Budg just released a significant study, prepared at the request of the Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, examining the evidence on the costs and benefits of health information technology.

“Health IT” generally refers to computer applications for the practice of medicine. (Those applications may include computerized entry systems for physicians’ orders for tests or medications, support systems for clinical decisionmaking, and electronic prescribing of medications.) Relatively few providers—as of 2006, about 12 percent of physicians and 11 percent of hospitals—have adopted health IT.

Source: Congressional Budget Office

EPA's Report on the Environment

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued the 2008 EPA Report on the Environment yesterday, a document that provides the American people with information on trends in the condition of air, water, and land and related changes in human health in the United States.

The EPA 2008 ROE is a valuable resource that will inform and focus EPA activities to improve and protect America’s environment. The report frames key questions related to the protection of human health and the environment, and addresses each issue using scientifically sound indicators that have been developed with extensive public input. The 2008 ROE updates a draft report released by EPA in 2003. EPA’s 2008 Report on the Environment: http://www.epa.gov/roe.

Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

Homeland Security Students: Trial Database!

NEW TRIAL STARTED TODAY IN YOUR HONOR!

International Security & Counter-Terrorism Reference Center™ (ISCTRC)
This database offers information on virtually every dimension of security & counter-terrorism and is designed to inform the analysis process, as well as to enhance the general understanding of security and terrorism-related issues. ISCTRC provides a comprehensive Open Source Intelligence Resource for analysts, risk management professionals, and students.

Content includes hundreds of full text journals and periodicals, hundreds of thousands of selected articles, news feeds, reports, summaries, books, blogs, FAQs, and proprietary Background Information Summaries that pertain to terrorism and security. ISCTRC also combines deep background from scholarly writings with expert commentary from a variety of organizations, agencies and publisher and timely reviews of recent developments across the international political, military, economic, social and technical spectrum.
An Images file of over 9,000 pertinent images has been added to the database. Users can access applicable images on a Result List, under the Images sub-tab.

Access: On library pagelook under Library Resources in "Find Articles-Databases." Then click on "EBSCO databases" and choose ISCTRC or

http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?authtype=ip,uid&profile=isctrc

What they're Reading on College Campuses

1. A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose by Eckhart Tolle
2. The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream by Obama
3. Armageddon in Retrospect by Kurt Vonnegut
4. The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow
5. Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
6. Flipping Brilliant: A Penguin's Guide to a Happy Life by Chester & Regan
7. Curious You: On Your Way by H. A. Roy
8. Eat, Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
9. I Am America (And So Can You) by Stephen Colbert
10. Skinny Bitch by Freedman and Barnouin

New Open Access Humanities Press

Scholars in the sciences have been light-years ahead of their peers in the humanities in exploring the possibilities of open-access publishing. But a new venture with prominent academic backers, the Open Humanities Press, wants to help humanists close the gap.

The nonprofit operation—described by those involved as "an international open-access publishing collective"—made its official debut last week with a roster of seven already-established journals in critical and cultural studies and related fields: Cosmos and History, Culture Machine, Fibreculture, Film-Philosophy, International Journal of Zizek Studies, Parrhesia, and Vectors.
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education

English class With an Edge

English teacher Andie Brown in Manchester, MO, believes in sedition--well, a form of it, anyway. She purposely gives her students the assignment to challenge the status quo, and they use technology as a means toward that end. The result is truly meaningful education; students learn that what they do may have a powerful impact. In her Vonnegut class, they study contemporary satire. The final assignment is for students in groups of two or three to create a three- to five-minute satiric film. (They used Mac computers and imovie as well as Youtube.)


"Ms Brown says, "figuring out a way to take advantage of something like YouTube was my aha moment. Students today sometimes don't believe that they can make a difference in society. In a pendulum swing that's polar, where my generation tuned out, this generation has plugged in, but the effect is the same. When the students see their small movie projects screened and really get to feel the response of the audience, they seem to deeply understand the place satire has in a free society. They also see that there are many, varied ways to seek change, but that humor and art are two of them." Wow!
Source: The Journal May 2008

Student Retention

Student Retention: Are Schools Taking Advantage of Technology?

College and university administrators consider personal attention to be the most critical factor in retaining at risk students. But what role should technology play in the effort? While many consider technology-based interventions important to student retention, few seem to be using such solutions, and only 2 percent have any kind of early warning system in place to identify at risk students, according to data released to Campus Technology by higher education strategy firm EducationDynamics.

Read Complete Article:
http://www.1105newsletters.com/t.do?id=1182711:1202596

National Library Legislative Day May 14

We need your voice to be heard on National Library Legislative Day (May 14)!
We need you to join the thousands of other librarians, library workers, trustees, and library users participating in "Virtual Library Legislative Day!"

Please take 10-15 minutes today or tomorrow to send a message to all of your congressional representatives, letting them know how important libraries are to society, and the need for:

more federal funding for libraries
a certified school media specialist in every school
fair copyright laws
an expanded role for libraries in E-Government
national security letter reform
ALA's Legislative Action Center provides you with talking points on these important issues. You can use them to craft your message as you wish, and send it to all of your representatives.

Thanks so much for taking a few minutes out of your day to help libraries across the nation

Book of the Week

Our Iceberg is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions by John Kotter

This is a simple fable about doing well in an ever-changing world. The fable is about a penguin colony in Antarctica. A group of beautiful emperor penguisn live as they have for many years.Then one curious bird discovers a potentially devastating problem threatening their homes--and pretty much no one listens to him. It is based on Eight Steps that produce needed change in any sort of group. This book is now available in the library and was recommended by Jack Matthews.

Idea for Homeland Security

Idaho State Simulates Emergency Response in Second Life

Imagine entering the virtual world Second Life to discover that a flu pandemic requires you, a health care professional, to attend to stricken patients lying on the streets around an over-capacity virtual hospital. When you report in to collect your virtual uniform, you're told what your responsibilities will be during the disaster and to whom you'll report.

Read Complete Article:
http://www.campustechnology.com/articles/61150

The Blog is Back!

GREETINGS FROM CORNWALL

Celebrate Arbor Day

Today, April 25, is Arbor Day.a day to celebrate trees. Arbor Day is a nationally-celebrated observance that encourages tree planting and care. Founded by J. Sterling Morton in Nebraska in 1872, National Arbor Day is celebrated each year on the last Friday in April. Visit the Arbor Day Foundation online for more information.

Free Access to GreenFile

We now have free access to GreenFile, an EBSCO bibliographical database of information about environmental concerns such as global warming, energy conservation, natural resources, and pollution. GreenFile covers content going back more than 35 years and contains back files of volume one, issue one for Bioscience: Journal of Environmental Planning & Management, Journal of Ecology, and Conservation Biology. The database also contains bibliographic information for key non-scholarly titles such as E-The Environmental Magazine, Natural Life, and Mother Earth News. The database contains nearly 300,000 records, full text for certain titles and searchable cited references for more than 200 titles as well.

This resource offers a unique perspective on the positive and negative ways humans affect the environment. Drawing on the connection between the environment and disciplines such as agriculture, education, law, health and technology, GreenFILE serves as an informative resource for anyone concerned about the issues facing our planet.


To access GreenFile, go to http://www.greeninfoonline.com.

CQ Researcher this week: Cost of the Iraq War

The fifth anniversary of the Iraq War hit just as the subprime mortgage crisis and rising unemployment in the United States were turning the economic situation bleak. Against this backdrop, a Nobel laureate economist and a federal budget expert linked the economic downturn to the war and calculated its eventual total financial cost at $3 trillion and possibly even more, plus the tens of thousands of Americans and Iraqis killed or wounded. President George W. Bush dismisses the linkage argument, contending the war creates job opportunities at home and that military spending in Iraq and Afghanistan amounts to only a "modest fraction" of the U.S. economy. But even Republican lawmakers have been asking why taxpayers are funding much of the rebuilding of oil-rich Iraq while it reaps billions in profits thanks to record-high oil prices. For its part, the administration says Iraq is now starting to bear more of the reconstruction costs.

Source: CQ Researcher online

New Books for Homeland Security Students

Just War and Terrorism: The End of the Just War Concept edited by W. Smit. This book offers the interested reader a wide spectrum of views on one of the most challenging issues in politicis today--war and its justification. The essays here are offered as a call to stir up and reconsider our settled opinions on the matter.

How Just is the War on Terror? by Eileen Flynn. "In this timely treatment of nightmarish issues that make up the war on terror, Flynn flexes the moral muscle of the just war tradition. In her hands, the just war theory is not the mere plaything of an armchair philosopher, but compels real constraint on social and personal conduct in war." (quoted from Richard Gula, professor at Berkeley, California)

Both of these books were recommended by Ron Lee of the Homeland Security program.

Sand County Almanac

The library now has a stunning illustrated edition of Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac. It includes a new introduction discussing America's greatest naturalist's work and legacy and concludes with two of his most eloquent essays on conservation. You must read this for the first time or again.

"If the environmental movement has sacred texts--literary cornerstones--then they are Thoreau's Walden, George Perkins Marsh's Man and Nature, Caron's Silent Spring, and Leopold's A Sand County Almanac. The almanac is an epochal, seminal, ageless work. It is the bible still for land managers, koran for those who work the soil where literature overlaps ecology, urtext for the ecological restoeation movement."
-quoted from the introduction by Kenneth Brower.

A Nation at Risk: 25 Years Later

This week, Education Week kicks off a yearlong series:
A Nation at Risk: 25 Years Later.
The series includes exclusive commentaries, feature stories, profiles of educational systems in China, Japan, India, and the European Union, and an interactive timeline of more than 100 Education Week stories tracking developments since release of the original report. Read it in the library.
Source: Education Week April 23 2008

Belated Happy Birthday to William Shakespeare

Happy Birthday to William Shakespeare!
On April 23, 1564, William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-on-Avon.
Celebrate the bard with this strategy outlined in the following resourcs for college students:
Using Shakespeare's Plays to Teach Critical Thinking and Writing Skills
Source: National Council of Teachers of English Newsletter

HAPPY EARTH DAY

New Design for LexisNexis

LexisNexis Academic is getting a new look on April 26, 2008.

Summary
The Display Is Changing
Top navigation tabs will look slightly different
Navigation elements will move from the right side to the left side of the page
Sub-tab such as the "Easy" and "Power" tabs under the "General" tab are being replaced with navigation options on the left side of the page
The beige background will be removed from the search forms
On the results page, the results classification options have been changed from a dropdown box to an expandable list
The spacing and layout of elements on the page will change
A new "Selected Sources" tray is being added to the Source Selection page

The Functionality Is Not Changing
Procedures for searching, choosing sources, and working with results are not changing

End of National Library Week

The library staff thanks you for your supportive comments during National Library Week. National Library Week was sponsored by the American Library Association. ALA is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 65,000 members. Its mission is to promote the highest quality library and information services and public access to information. ALA offers professional services and publications to members and nonmembers, including online news stories from American Libraries and analysis of crucial issues from the Washington Office. ALA includes members in academic, public, school, government, and special libraries. Melvil Dewey, Justin Winsor, C. A. Cutter, Samuel S. Green, James L. Whitney, Fred B. Perkins, and Thomas W. Bicknell founded the Association on October 6, 1876, in Philadelphia. The annual conference this year is in Anaheim from June 28 to July 2.

Global Researcher: Separatist Movements

Overview from the Global Researcher Report
When Kosovo declared its independence on Feb. 17, thousands of angry Serbs took to the streets to protest the breakaway region's secession from Serbia. Less than a month later, Chinese authorities battled Buddhist monks in Lhasa, the legendary capital of Tibet, where separatist resentments have been simmering since China occupied the Himalayan region more than 50 years ago. The protests were the latest flashpoints in some two dozen separatist “hot spots” — the most active of roughly 70 such movements around the globe. They are part of a post-World War II independence trend that has produced a nearly fourfold jump in the number of countries worldwide, with 26 of those new countries emerging just since 1990. Some nations, like the far-flung Kurds and the Sri Lankan Tamils, are fighting fiercely to establish a homeland, while others — like Canada's Québécois — seem content with local autonomy. A handful have become de facto states that are as-yet-unrecognized by the U.N., including Somaliland, Taiwan, South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The entire report is available from the library catalog (password protected).

CQ Researcher this Week: Public Defenders

Over the years, several landmark Supreme Court decisions have established the right of an indigent defendant to the assistance of counsel at public expense. But today critics say the nation's public defender system is in crisis. Roughly 80 to 85 percent of all criminal defendants in state courts, where most crimes are prosecuted, are indigent and represented by some kind of public counsel at an annual cost to states and counties of more than $3.5 billion. But many public defense lawyers and researchers argue that much more needs to be spent because funding for many indigent defense systems is "shamefully inadequate." Excessive caseloads, high turnover of underpaid lawyers, poor training and supervision and judicial interference are also blamed for many of the deficiencies. According to one expert, in some poorly funded systems in the field, a single public defender handles 1,000 cases a year. CQ Researcher's reports are available through the Goodwin Catalog (password protected).

Climate and the Stock Market

Earth Day is coming next week and the stock market is low enough to tempt one to invest. Climate Counts encourages you to consider investing with the climate in mind.Climate Counts is a collaborative effort to bring consumers and companies together in the fight against global climate change. They are a nonprofit organization funded by Stonyfield Farm, Inc. and launched in collaboration with Clean Air-Cool Planet. You can use the Climate Counts Company Scorecard to see how serious companies are about stopping climate change - and how they compare to their sector competitors. The annually updated scorecard reflects the self-reported efforts of companies to address climate change - or avoid it altogether.

Science Research: Recommended Site

Deep Web Technologies presents ScienceResearch.com™ - a free, publicly available web portal allowing access to numerous scientific journals and public science databases. It allows students, teachers, professors, researchers, and the general public to access pertinent science information quickly and easily. Science disciplines include: astronomy, biology & nature, chemistry, computers & technology, earth & environmental sciences, engineering, general science, health & medicine, materials science,mathematics, physics, and social sciences.

CafeScribe and Electronic Texts

Will the CafeScribe Acquisition Give a Boost to Electronic Textbooks?

The digital textbook is one of those technologies that seem obvious but can take a long time to gain traction. In March, the concept got a boost when long-time textbook distributor and retailer Follet Corp. acquired Salt Lake City-based Fourteen40, and, along with it, CafeScribe, a Web site in its beta phase of offering electronic textbooks.

Read Complete Article:
http://www.1105newsletters.com/t.do?id=1084508:1202596

Improving Reading Skills in College

The review essay "Learning to Read as Continuing Education", from College Composition and Communication, works to convince readers that college composition instruction can capitalize on (and improve) students' high school reading experiences if instructors and program administrators think carefully about where their students are starting as readers and where they want them to get by the end of the course.

21st Century Literacies

This definition of 21st century literacies was adopted by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)this year.

"Literacy has always been a collection of cultural and communicative practices shared among members of particular groups. As society and technology change, so does literacy. Because technology has increased the intensity and complexity of literate environments, the twenty-first century demands that a literate person possess a wide range of abilities and competencies, many literacies. These literacies—from reading online newspapers to participating in virtual classrooms—are multiple, dynamic, and malleable. As in the past, they are inextricably linked with particular histories, life possibilities and social trajectories of individuals and groups.

Twenty-first century readers and writers need to
• Develop proficiency with the tools of technology
• Build relationships with others to pose and solve problems collaboratively and cross culturally
• Design and share information for global communities to meet a variety of purposes
• Manage, analyze and synthesize multiple streams of simultaneous information
• Create, critique, analyze, and evaluate multi-media texts
• Attend to the ethical responsibilities required by these complex environments"

Margaret Spellings, Where Are You?

Walking from meeting room to meeting room at this week’s annual conference of the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, and scanning the program, it was impossible not to be struck by the fact that a good half of the hundreds of sessions have embedded in their titles the words “student outcomes,” “assessment,” or “accountability.”

The volume and earnestness of the efforts was particularly jarring in the context of the mantra that has been heard so much from Education Secretary Margaret Spellings and other policy makers in Washington in the last two years, suggesting that colleges have been doing far too little to measure and make publicly available results about how much, and how effectively, their students are learning.
Read the article from Inside Higher Education

NATIONAL LIBRARY WORKERS DAY

National Library Workers Day
April 15, 2008

Our library works because they do!
Elizabeth Diamond
LaShonie Douglas
Shakira Greene
Crystalann Haines

Use the "Comment" to say something nice about our student workers!

Mental-Health Problems and Students

The facts and figures about mental-health problems on our campuses are sobering. When the American College Health Association's National College Health Assessment surveyed college students in the fall of 2006, 78 percent reported having felt very sad at least once within the preceding 12 months, 42 percent felt so depressed it was difficult to function, 9.4 percent had seriously considered attempting suicide, and 1.4 percent had attempted suicide. Fourteen percent of women and 10 percent of men reported feeling hopeless nine or more times.

Similarly, respondents to the 2007 National Survey of Counseling Center Directors reported that almost half of their student clients had severe psychological problems, and close to 8 percent had impairments so serious that they could not remain in college, or could do so only with extensive psychological or psychiatric help. On the 272 campuses surveyed, almost 2,000 students were hospitalized for psychological problems in 2007. Read the article in the Chronicle Review April 18.

Libraries in the News: Hastings Public Library

Built on a brownfield site, Hastings Public Library (Michigan) is targeted to receive a LEED Gold Certificate. Contributing to the library's rating are low VOC (volatile organic compound) furnishings and finishes, linoleum tabletops, condensing gas boilers, an underground air distribution system, vegetative roofs in the turrets, and toilet partitions made of recyled milk jugs.
Source: American Libraries April 2008

The day the Titanic Struck an Iceberg

A luxury liner on 14-15 April, 1912, struck an iceberg near Newfoundland on its maiden voyage and sank with the loss of 1513 lives. Thought to be unsinkable, the Titanic carried enough lifeboats for only half the passengers. As a result of the disaster safety rules for ships at sea were drawn up by the International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea (1913) and the International Ice Patrol was established. The wreck of the Titanic was located and photographed in 1985.
Source: CredoReference

Database Training: Health & Wellness Resource Center

The library is providing online web based training from Gale Publishers on Wednesday, April 16 in the conference room from 10 to ll a.m. The training is open to all members of the Goodwin community. Refreshments will be served.

Health & Wellness Resource Center is a comprehensive resource that provides integrated access to medical, statistical, health, and related information. Including the Gale Encyclopedia of medicine, Health & Wellness Resource Center delivers up-to-date reference material as well as full-text magazines, journals, and pamphlets from a wide variety of authoritative medical sources. Consumers, students, and professionals are provided with descriptions of and links to many pertinent websites selected for their usefulness and appropriateness. Topics covered in Wednesday's webinar include content and purpose of the database, database nivagation, searching techniques, and additional database features.

Library Statistics for March

Not suprising, 46% of the users of the library in March were students in the health sciences, nursing, and respiratory care. Of that group, 51% were in health sciences. Students from early childhood education and business were also well represented. 21% more students used the library in March this year over March of 2007. Circulation of materials increased by 21% in this March over March of 2007.

From January to April 1 this year the library loaned 111 books to other libraries while we borrowed only 49. This could indicate that our library resources are working well for the Goodwin community. It also indicates that we have materials that other libraries want to use.

Online College Fair

Check out a recent New York Times essay on a parent’s experience with CollegeWeekLive.com, a virtual college fair where students and parents chat live with admissions officers from 200 institutions.

One thing Michelle Slatalla, the essay’s author, seemed to miss about going to a real (offline) college fair was the ability to follow the crowd to the “most selective” institutions: “here there was no way to gauge whether more attendees were flocking to Bryn Mawr College or Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa.”

The next CollegeWeekLive fair, which is free, is scheduled for the fall.
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education Wire Campus

National Library Week

It's National Library Week, a time to celebrate the contributions of libraries, librarians, and library workers in schools, campuses and communities nationwide--and the perfect time to discover how you can join the circle of knowledge @ your library.
First sponsored in 1958, National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and libraries across the country each April.

THE LIBRARY STAFF INVITES YOU TO VISIT THE LIBRARY DURING NATIONAL LIBRARY WEEK. YOU WON'T BE SORRY!

Library of Congress Online Exhibit

The Library of Congress opened a new interactive Web site on Saturday, as a companion to a high-tech exhibit designed to give visitors a close-up view of some of the institution's treasures. A copy of the Gutenberg Bible, for instance, is in a glass case at the library, but the new Web site will let users flip through the book and zoom in on its pages virtually. An article in Ars Technica points out that the exhibit is the result of a $3-million gift from Microsoft to promote the use of the company's latest multimedia platform, called Silverlight. The exhibit sounds like a theme park ride -- it's called The Library of Congress Experience.
Source: Library of Congress Experience

U.S. Waterpipes are Breaking

"Two hours north of New York City, a mile-long stream and a marsh the size of a football field have mysteriously formed along a country road. They are such a marvel that people come from miles around to drink the crystal-clear water, believing it is bubbling up from a hidden natural spring. The truth is far less romantic: The water is coming from a cracked 70-year-old tunnel hundreds of feet below ground, scientists say. The tunnel is leaking up to 36 million gallons a day as it carries drinking water from a reservoir to the big city. It is a powerful warning sign of a larger problem around the country: The infrastructure that delivers water to the nation's cities is badly aging and in need of repairs.

The Environmental Protection Agency says utilities will need to invest more than $277 billion over the next two decades on repairs and improvements to drinking water systems. Water industry engineers put the figure drastically higher, at about $480 million. Water utilities, largely managed by city governments, have never faced improvements of this magnitude before. And customers will have to bear the majority of the cost through rate increases, according to the American Water Works Association, an industry group."
Source: Colleen Long reported for the Associated Press April 9, 2008.

Portals to the World

A simple and elegant site. Each link opens a country page where more links pages under each topic are given. Brief and sensible annotations are provided. These pages link you to the best web pages available for every and any country.
Library of Congress, Portals to the World.

Libraries in the News

Located underground beneath the campus's Sterling Memorial main library, Bass Library at Yale University houses 150,000 high-use items. The renovated facility includes individual study rooms, two electronic classrooms, a cafe, and a new entrance pavilion in Collegiate Gothic Style. This is in New haven--go see it!
Size: 59,800 sq. ft.
Cost of renovation: $47.5 million

Global Reach:: Europe

Vincent Van Gogh's down-at-heel boots were the first thing to appear on the test website of the European Digital Library last month. Btanded Europeana, the website will break new ground by bringing together millions of digitized resources from Europe's archives, museums, libraries, and audiovisual collections through a single portal. The full site is scheduled to launch in November.
Source: European Digital Library Network

Today, April 8: Flower Festival

Today is the Buddha’s birthday observed in Buddhist temples throughout Japan, where it is known as Kambutsu-e. The highlight of the celebration is a ritual known as kambutsue (“ceremony of ‘baptizing’ the Buddha”), in which a tiny bronze statue of the Buddha, standing in an open lotus flower, is anointed with sweet tea. People use a small bamboo ladle to pour the tea, made of hydrangea leaves, over the head of the statue. The custom is supposed to date from the seventh century, when perfume was used, as well as tea. Festivities often include a procession of children carrying flowers.
Source: Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations of the World Dictionary

New Additions to Credo Reference

Keywords and Concepts in Evolutionary Developmental Biology, Harvard University Press in Science

Handbook of United States Economic and Financial Indicators, Greenwood in Business

Notable American Women: 1607-1950, A Biographical Dictionary, Harvard University Press in Biography

Notable American Women: The Modern Period, A Biographical Dictionary, Harvard University Press in Biography

Credo Reference is a leading provider of reference services for libraries and information centers. This service provides you with over 270 full-text titles consisting of an aggregate of 3.1 million entries all interconnected by over 100,000,000 links.

New Latin America: Global Researcher

Latin America is struggling to re-define its soul. The region's once ubiquitous military dictators in dark glasses have been replaced by a new generation of democratically elected leaders. Under their tutelage Latin America is enjoying steady growth and trying to bridge the notoriously deep chasm between the rich and the poor. Wealth and global trade have brought a new sense of cohesion and an unprecedented regional identity, while newly empowered women and indigenous and mixed-race populations are transforming the political landscape. Amid these positive signs, experts ask whether the future belongs to the more moderate, market-oriented democracies — such as those in Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Argentina — or to the more radical, left-wing populism inspired by Venezuela's bombastic socialist leader Hugo Chávez. Meanwhile, with the United States preoccupied in Iraq and elsewhere, the European Union, the Gulf States and China are increasing their economic presence in the region as U.S. influence declines. Read the report online from the Goodwin Library (password protected).

Preventing Memory Loss: CQ Researcher

As the nation's baby boomers age, they are increasingly worried that their memories will deteriorate — and with good reason. An estimated 10 million boomers will develop Alzheimer's disease or another memory-destroying neurodegenerative condition in the coming years. Policy makers and health officials worry that the resulting bulge in the number of sufferers will burden the nation's already strained health-care system. In the wake of these concerns, a vibrant brain-fitness industry is offering a variety of ways to help people keep their brains healthy, including the use of cognition-enhancing drugs and exercise. But many experts say much of what the public is being told is of limited value, at best. Intensified brain research begun years ago at the National Institutes of Health is just now beginning to produce data that scientists hope will advance efforts to prevent memory loss, but they worry that flat federal funding since 2003 may compromise the drive for solutions. Read the entire report available online from the Goodwin Library.
Source: CQ Researcher April 4, 2008

Oxford Reference Online Trial

Oxford Reference online: Premium Collection combines rich and scholarly resources with authoritative, quick-reference coverage of the full subject spectrum. It also offers excellent functionality, and a wide range of additional material such as maps, illustrations, and timelines.
175+ Oxford reference titles
Over 1.3 million entries, many from an expanding range of acclaimed titles in the Oxford Companions series
All 20,000+ quotation entries from the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations
15,540+ illustrations, including colour photographs, line diagrams, tables, etc
42 Timelines
775+ maps
36,000+ invaluable bibliographies
167,000+ biographical entries
3,165+ external web links
Enhanced search functions to access results by category
New and revised titles added regularly
TRY IT!
Trial URL: http://www.oxfordreference.com
username: waldolib
password: waldolib

Shrug Off Remediation with Learning Communities

"Opening Doors" by Scrivener, Bloom, LeBlanc, Paxson, Rouse and Sommo

Currently one of the most significant challenges facing education is how to meet the needs of students who lack basic reading, writing and math skills. This problem is ever present in the need for remediation as 29% of incoming college freshmen enroll in at least one development/remedial class. To help these students, schools have turned to "learning communities" wherein students take remedial classess linked with other college-level courses. A new study of a one-semester learning community for freshmen offers the first experimental evidence that learnintg communities help students make a successful transition to college and move more quickly through developmental English requirements. The program places freshmen in groups of up to 25that take three classes together during their first semester. Also included is enhanced counseling and tutoring. Read the article.

Challenges of Low Literacy

How can we better communicate the challenges of low literacy in the 21st Century? Share your thoughts on this issue. The National Center for Family Literacy is launching a blog, Literacy Now, to provide an opportunity for anyone engaged or interested in the cause of literacy to share information, news, and insights. You can access the blog anytime at http://www.famlit.org/blog.
Source: National Center for Family Literacy

USPTO Rejects Blackboard Patent Claims

Blackboard's e-learning patent looks to be going down. The United States Patent and Trademark Office last week sent out a "non-final" determination on the reexamination of Blackboard's patent in which all of the claims on the patent were rejected. Blackboard still has a period of two months to respond to the determination.

We spoke with representatives from the two parties that filed for the reexamination of the patent: Desire2Learn and the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC). Their comments follow. Blackboard itself chose to release a statement (approximately 3:30 p.m. PDT) rather than speak directly with us today, although we might have additional comments next week.

While Desire2Learn and the SFLC celebrated the decision, Blackboard said that its patent still stands, that the company does not intend to back down, and that the decision has no effect on Blackboard's patent infringement suit victory over Desire2Learn.
Source: Campus Technology online March 28, 2008

Homeland Security Critical Releases

Critical Releases in Homeland Security [March 2008]
Every two weeks, the Homeland Security Digital Library identifies "Critical Releases in Homeland Security," a targeted collection of recently-released documents that are expected to influence homeland security policy & strategy development.

Review of the FBI's Use of National Security Letters: Assessment of Corrective Actions and Examination of NSL Usage in 2006, March 2008
United States. Dept. of Justice. Office of the Inspector General

Potential Impacts of Climate Change on U.S. Transportation: Special Report 209
National Academies Press (U.S.)

Financial Action Task Force: Terrorist Financing
Financial Action Task Force

Federal Guidance to Assist States in Improving State-Level Pandemic Influenza Operating Plans
United States Government

Air Force Cyber Command Strategic Vision
United States. Air Force

Source: Homeland Security Library

Power to the People?

Are our customers (students) talking about our brand right now on MySpace--probably in ways we wouldn't approve? Are conversations with students showing up on YouTube intercut with sarcastic comentary? This may have somone in administration tearing his or her hair out--no names mentioned. Like a flood, it can't be stopped in any one place and perhaps not at all. This is all leading up to--yes, you guessed it--a new book out in May called Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff. They explain how you can turn this "threat" into your greatest asset. With tools and data straight fromm one of the nation's top research firms, you'll learn how to evaluate new social technologies as they emerge and how to make them a part of your strategies. Who is first to reserve this book?? (Some of the clever comments here are revised a little from the book.)
Source: Harvard Business Review

Connecticut-Sized Ice Shelf Crumbling in Antarctica

Antarctica's Wilkins Ice Shelf is a plate of permanent floating ice that covers an area the size of Connecticut. The shelf started to collapse late last month, when a large iceberg 25 miles long broke off and floated away. Since then, an area the size of Chicago has broken up, probably because of warming and the action of waves.
Source: National Public Radio today

What is Grey Literature?

Grey Literature: That which is produced on all levels of government, academics, business and industry in print and electronic formats, but which is not controlled by commercial publishers. This includes materials that never make it into our databases.

But help is at hand. The Grey Literature Report is a bimonthly publication of The New York Academy of Medicine Library alerting readers to new grey literature publications in health services research and selected public health topics.
The current Grey Literature Report Vol. 10, No. 1 - January 2008 is available.

Women in Politics: CQ Researcher

The number of women holding political office in the United States has grown substantially over the past two decades. But even with a record number of 86 women in Congress today, men still outnumber women by more than 5-to-1. Historically, women faced significant disadvantages in running for office and winning voter approval. Experts say those barriers are lower today, but perhaps not completely gone.. . .
Source: CQ Researcher

NEW BOOKS IN THE LIBRARY

FICTION
Away by Amy Bloom
Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
True to the Crime by Teri Woods
Five Forty-Five to Cannes by Tess U. Holthe
Complete Stories by David Malouf
Pesthouse by Jim Crace
Ministry of Special Cases by Nathan Englander

NONFICTION
Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris
Holler if You Hear Me by Michael Eric Dyson
Oil on the Brain by Lisa Margonelli
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
Spirituality in Nursing by Mary E. O’Brien
Sea Around Us by Rachel Carson
Life in the Soil: Guide for Naturalists and Gardeners by James Nardi
Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson
Right to Vote: Contested History of Democracy in the United States by Alexandr Yessar
World Without Us by Alan Weisman
Oxford Companion to English Literature edited by Margaret Drabble

Belated Happy Pi Day!

I was at a meeting Friday, March 14 (3.14) and missed Pi Day. It's not too late to celebrate! (Picture comes from GeekDads blog.)

Arthur C. Clarke 1917-2008

This week the worlds of science and science fiction lost one of their true visionaries, Arthur C. Clarke, author of seminal works like 2001: A Space Odyssey and Rendezvous with Rama. Mr. Clarke increased our fascination with science and technology. As one admirer wrote, "the sky is filled with one more star now."

This Week's Brain Teaser: All Things Blue

This week's brainteaser is all about things or people that are called blue.
1. "Big Blue" is a nickname for which computer company?
2. Which creature, with "blue" in its name, is generally considered to be the largest living animal?
3. The "Blue Peter" is a flag flown on a ship when it is about to do what?
4. "Blue berets" is the name by which the military members of which kind of operation are often described?
5. "Ol' Blue Eyes" was a nickname for which popular US singer?
6. In skiing, is a "blue run" an easy run or a difficult one?
7. The famous Blue Mosque, also known as the Mosque of Sultan Ahmed I, is in which country?
8. Which 1968 cartoon film incuded bizarre malevolent ogres called the Blue Meanies?
9. What was the title of the 1924 composition for piano and orchestra by George Gershwin with "blue" in the title?
10. "Bluenose" is an informal word for a native or inhabitant of which province?
(Answers Friday!)

New Book: Stressed Out About Nursing

Stressed Out About Your First Year of Nursing is a survival guide for new graduate nurses that steers them through the transition from student nurse to competent RN.

They will get the whole truth on what they didn’t learn in school and find out what to expect during the first year. Easy-to-read and full of sound advice, the book helps new graduates navigate through the first year on the job, from orientation and preceptors to communication and collaboration, including all the tips and tools they need to succeed.

With helpful icons that highlight tips to remember and secrets of success, they will find out all about:
why nursing is so demanding and how to survive
what to expect during orientation
the common causes of stress and how to handle them
how to transition from student nurse to new graduate
the stages of competence
how to handle horizontal hostility
survival skills
how to avoid legal pitfalls and stay out of trouble

This book just arrived in the library!

Change in LexisNexis Academic Database

Major improvements have been announced in the appearance and navigational elements of LexisNexis Academic. The change is scheduled to take place on Saturday April 26, 2008. With the exception of one enhancement to the Source Selection interface, these changes are purely related to visual design. The functionality of the product will not be changing, and we expect that most users will not be disorientated for more than a few moments by the change.
Source: News from LexisNexis

Women in Higher Education: Legacy of Leadership

The legacy of women in higher education is well documented and the legacy continues. Women in high level positions at colleges and universities across the country are spearheading the adoption of technology and shaping the future of higher education in the process. Join an exciting FREE webinar March 25th at 2 p.m. focusing on the use and benefits of class-capture technology in leading higher education institutions.

A panel of highly accomplished women, will discuss the impact of this new institution-wide technology on the core of educational mission, with-out changing tried and true teaching practices. The result is improved satisfaction and performance among students.

New to webinars? All you need is a computer with internet access and a telephone. Once you register, they will email easy-to-follow instructions. If you cannot attend just click on Send me a link to the Tegrity-recorded session.
Source: Tegrity