1100 more books in ebrary Academic Complete

New in Academic Complete
Ebrary recently added over 1,100 multidisciplinary titles from National Academies Press, New Age International, World Trade Press, University of Chicago Press, and other leading publishers. Some of the titles include:
Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook: A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius and Betrayal, by Ben Mezrich (Anchor, 2010)

Brain Sense: The Science of the Senses and How We Process the World Around Us,
by Faith Hickman Brynie (AMACOM, 2009)

Discrete Mathematics, by B.S. Vasta and Suchi Vasta (New Age International, 2009)

Innocent Bystanders: Developing Countries and the War on Drugs, by Philip Keefer and Norman Loayza (World Bank, 2010)

Spirituality and Aging, by Robert C. Atchley (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009)

Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals,by Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce
(University of Chicago Press, 2009)

African American Experience Database

Even with the best of intentions, most librarians can't find the materials or the funding to satisfy students investigating the historical impact of African Americans on today's world. However, we now have a new resource offering students and teachers a wealth of cultural materials specifically designed for classroom research and personal inquiry.

The widest ranging and easiest-to-use online collection on African American life ever assembled, The African American Experience is the definitive electronic research tool for African American history and culture from one of the most respected publishers in the field. It provides rock-solid information from authorities in the field and to allows African Americans to speak for themselves through a wealth of primary sources. Drawing on over 450 titles, and designed under the guidance of leading librarians, this database gives voice to the black experience from its African origins to the present day.

-New material from print reference titles and multivolume sets, such as Barack Obama, the New Face of American Politics; The Martin Luther King, Jr. Encyclopedia; Encyclopedia of the Middle Passage; Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers [2 Volumes]; and Icons of Hip Hop [2 Volumes].
-A deep backlist of reference books and monographs, many now available in electronic format for the first time
-Over 5,000 primary documents: manuscripts, speeches, court cases, quotations, -advertisements, statistics, and other papers
-Over 3,500 interviews with former slaves-the WPA slave narratives-from the acclaimed The American Slave: A Composite Autobiography, now re-indexed and for the first time fully searchable
-Sixty-seven University Press texts from the early 1800s to the early 1970s—classics in black scholarship.

Try it here.

Ebrary Academic Complete

Ebrary Academic Complete is a highly interactive eBook database that covers all academic subject areas. The collection currently includes more than 50,000 titles from more than 220 of the world’s leading academic publishers.




Each individual eBook in Academic Complete integrates with information in ourlibrary and on the web through the ebrary Reader™ and InfoTools™ software. Just by highlighting any word of interest in Academic Complete, you can instantly search against our OPAC or other online resources in the library, and information
on the Internet, without leaving the current document.

New Environmental Database

GREENR (Global Reference on the Environment, Energy, and Natural Resources) is a new online resource that offers authoritative content on the development of emerging green technologies and discusses issues on the environment, sustainability and more. GREENR is an important part of a new generation of solutions from Gale designed with users in mind.

GREENR is interactive and current, allowing users to navigate issue, organization and country portals. It's a one-stop site dedicated to studying sustainability and the environment.

This database will be available for Goodwin Students beginning Monday, November 15.

Latest Additions to Credo General Reference

Credo's General Reference collection continues to grow each month and now has over 515 titles.

The following well-regarded titles were added in October:
• Culture Wars: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints, and Voices, M.E. Sharpe
• Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Psychology, Hodder Education
• The Encyclopedia of Strikes in American History, M.E. Sharpe
• The Essentials of Global Politics, Hodder Education
• The World of Child Labor: An Historical and Regional Survey, M.E. Sharpe

Video: Academic gap widens for black males

A new study showing that most black American male students perform worse then their peers by almost every measure suggests that some of the obstacles to their academic success start before school the school bell even rings. NBC's Ron Allen reports.

WATCH VIDEO HERE.

Source: New York Times Novembeer 9 2010

Imagine Science Short Film

At the Imagine Science Film Festival in New York last month, Skhizein directed by Jeremy Clapin won honorable mention. It uses sophisticated computer graphics as its hero descends into schizophrenia.

SKHIZEIN is a strange film that begins with a man at a psychiatrist's office talking about his problem. It seems that since a meteorite struck nearby, he's been "out of phase". In other words, every thing he does is 91 centimeters off (that's a yard for all of us non-metric folks)!

Unique, compelling and clever--what more could you want from an animated short of about 13 minutes.
SKHIZEIN Part 1

SKHIZEIN Part 2

Source: "learning to Love Science Films" Nature November 4 2010

Environmental Health

"Our environment affects our health. Our average life span has almost doubled over the past century or so mainly because we have clean, safe drinking water. If parts of the environment, like air and water, or soil become polluted, it can lead to health problems. For example, asthma attacks can result from pollutants and other chemicals in the air and in the home.

Some environmental risks are a part of the natural world, like radon in the soil. Others are the result of human activities, like lead poisoning from paint, or exposure to asbestos or mercury from mining or industrial use."

MedlinePlus includes Environmental Health among its many topics. The site is available in Spanish as well as English and includes abundant additional information on related topics. You can sign up for an email update: www.medlineplus.org

Source: NIH: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Library Circulates Kill a Watt Monitor

It's more than books here, folks. The library is now circulating Kill A Watt EZ electricity usage monitor.

The device measures the energy consumption of electrical appliances. Just plug it into a wall socket and then plug in your appliance to assess how efficient it is. Program in your local utility rate and display projected costs. The meter will circulate with a protective case and complete instructions. Pick it up at the circulation desk. The knowledge you gain can save you thousands of dollars.

No Cureballs for Higher Education

WASHINGTON -- Final tallies of exactly how many seats Republicans gained Tuesday in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate are days -- if not weeks -- away (though by early Wednesday morning, the major news networks were projecting gains of more than 60 seats in the House). But anyone who didn’t stay up all night watching election results pour in has woken up to a GOP-led House of Representatives and a Senate guided by a small Democratic majority.

What do the results mean for federal higher education policy and the members of Congress who’ve played key roles in crafting those policies?

Read this article from Inside Higher Ed.

Source: Inside Higher Ed November 3, 2010

Sign at Rally to Restore Sanity

Do you think this sign at the Rally to Restore Sanity could be associated with a college?

The Gulf Between Us

"The oil is not gone. This story is not over. We smelled it in the air. We felt it in the water. People along the Gulf Coast are getting sick and sicker. Marshes are burned. Oysters are scarce and shrimp are tainted. Jobs are gone and stress is high. What is now hidden will surface over time.

Meanwhile, 1 billion birds are migrating through the Gulf of Mexico this fall, resting, feeding, and finding sanctuary as they have always done, generation after generation. The endangered piping plover will be among them. Seventy percent of all waterfowl in North America fly through the Mississippi Delta. Their energy will be compromised, with food not as plentiful. Their health will be vulnerable to the toxic traces of oil and dispersants lingering in the marshes."

Please read this article by Terry Tempest Williams in Orion Magazine:
"The Gulf Between Us:Stories of terror and beauty from the world's largest accidental offshore oil disaster."

A web extra, and companion to Terry Tempest Williams's article about the 2010 BP Gulf oil spill, containing extra images and audio narrative from photographer J Henry Fair.

CQ RESEARCHER REPORTS IN OCTOBER

Animal Intelligence October 22
Do animals think?
Australian scientists recently reported that octopuses were the first invertebrates to be observed using tools. In January, in a laboratory, a crow became the first bird to show “insight” — grasping the solution to a problem by mental activity, not trial-and-error behavior. Today virtually all animal scientists agree that animals — down through the insect kingdom — have amazing powers of mind.

States and Federalism October 15
Is the federal government usurping states’ rights?
Arizona enacted Medicaid cuts early this year only to have the action countermanded by the Obama administration's recently passed health care law. Arizona is now one of 20 states challenging the new law as unconstitutional. Meanwhile, the state is also tangling with the federal government over national immigration policy. The cases highlight the recurrence of high-profile clashes over federal power and state prerogatives.

Journalism Standards in the Internet Age October 8
Are the news media sacrificing news ethics online?
Press critic A.J. Liebling of The New Yorker wrote in 1960 that “freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” A half-century later, everyone with an Internet connection owns a virtual press. And many of them scorn the journalism standards that have guided America's mainstream media since before Liebling penned his famous aphorism.

Preventing Obesity October 1
Do Americans face too many obstacles to healthy eating?
The number of obese Americans has increased dramatically over the last 40 years, and in 2001 the nation's surgeon general went so far as to call obesity an epidemic. One-third of children and two-thirds of adults are overweight or obese, posing a daunting public-health challenge.

The last report of the month will be Democrats’ Future.

PROQUEST CENTRAL coming soon!

The library has signed up for a free trial of Proquest Central beginning November 1.

ProQuest Central is the largest aggregated full-text database in the market today totaling more than 13,970 titles—with over 10,910 titles in full text. It serves as the central resource for researchers at all levels in all markets.

While ProQuest Central provides access to millions of much-coveted full text articles from thousands of scholarly journals, it also provides access to information not available in other aggregated resources such as:

•Over 880 full text U.S., Canadian and international newspapers including exclusive access to the full text of The Wall Street Journal and Los Angeles Times
•Over 34,200 full text dissertations in the areas of business, psychology, physical sciences, health, education and more, helping end users build a more robust results set
•Concise business information from nearly 9,000 market reports across 43 industries in 40 countries, spanning the UK, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia Pacific, North America, and Latin America.

Format: Abstract and index, Full Text, Full Image, Text+Graphics
Media: Electronic/Online
Coverage: 1905-Present
Total Sources Covered: 13,970+
MARC Records: YES | Counter COMPLIANT: YES | ATHENS enabled: YES
Open URL enabled: YES | z39.50 enabled: YES

Book Display in Honor of the Half-Moon

Fatal Journey: The Final Expedition of Henry Hudson by P. Mancall

Rhinecliff: A Hudson River History. The Tangled Tale of Rhinebeck’s Waterfront by C. Philip

The Hudson: A History by T. Lewis

Henry Hudson in Holland: An Inquiry into the Origin & Objects of the Voyage Which Led to the Discovery of the Hudson River by H. Murphy

Peekskill’s African American History: A Hudson Valley Community Untold Story by J. Curran

Denning’s Point: A Hudson River History by j. Heron

Official Program, Hudson-Fulton Celebration; Discovery of the Hudson River by Henry Hudson, 1609; Inauguration of Steam Navigation by Hudson-Fulton Celebration Commission

Island at the Center of the World by R. Shorto

Henry Hudson and the Algonquins of New York by E. Pritchard

Dutch New York: The Roots of Hudson Valley Culture edited by R. Panetta

Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving

Ethnographic Video Online From the Library

A new online resource lets you stream, cross-search, annotate, and share hundreds of classic and contemporary documentaries. The library has arranged free access to this exciting resource through December 31. Call the library for access information.



A comprehensive online resource for the visual study of human culture and behavior and the largest, most affordable streaming video collection of its kind, Ethnographic Video Online contains more than 750 hours of classic and contemporary documentaries produced by leading video producers in the discipline; previously unpublished footage from working anthropologists and ethnographers in the field; and select feature films. Wherever possible, videos include accompanying field notes, liner notes, filmmaker biographies, related articles, study guides, and other context-enhancing, full-text materials. Learn more about Ethnographic Video Online here

FREE COUPONS IN THE LIBRARY

FREE COUPONS IN THE LIBRARY
TAKE SOME
ADD SOME

What CT Government does for us

Interlibrary Loan Service 2010
Our Interlibrary Loan services is provided by the Connecticut State Library with delivery by Connecticar (Ccar). It serves 226 libraries with 2.75 million items shipped. The average delivery time is usually several business days.
Cost using Ccar =$580,000
Cost to do this using USPS =$7,101,000
Cost to our library =$0

ICONN
-over 8 million page views
-2,312,183 searches in statewide catalog
-200 libraries lent 130,448 items through reQuest, a 6% increase
-22.1 million items now in reQuest
-$27 million-the value of all iCONN databases to local communities

Source: Connecticut State Library/Division of Library Development

New England Library Association Conference

Yesterday, I attended the opening day of the New England Library Conference at Boxborough, MA. The New England Library Association (NELA) is a membership organization for library staff and supporters in the New England States. The theme of this year’s conference was “Outside the Box; Results Support Sustainability.”

The first session was “Meeting the Challenge: Libraries in a Time of Change presented by American Library Association Executive Director, Keith Michael Fiels” who refuted the many myths about libraries and librarians. The Jordan Miller Storytelling program featured Judith Black, nationally recognized storyteller, who explored expanding literacy through stories and the current problem of the rampant self-censorship of children's literature. In the annual discussion group, State of the States, representatives of each state agency provided gloomy status reports on coping with current realities of decreasing funding and increasing service demands. Featured speaker at the banquet was Joe Raiola, Senior Editor of MAD magazine and a long-time First Amendment champion. His Joy of Censorship presentation included an illuminating, satiric and sometimes disturbing look at censorship and related issues. He also traced the unlikely and colorful history of MAD magazine and presented a survey of MAD’s most controversial covers and articles.

Next year's conference will be at Burlington, Vermont, earlier in October.

Source: Marilyn Nowlan

Mark Twain's Autobiography just arrived!

The library has an early release of Volume One of Mark Twain's uncensored autobiography. This major literary event brings us the first of three volumes presenting Twain's authentic and unsuppressed voice, brimming with humor, ideas, and opinions, and speaking clearly from the grave--as he intended. He left strict instructions that it not be published until 100 years after his death.

Who will be the first of the Goodwin Community to read it?

Autobiography of Mark Twain
Edited by Harriet Elinor Smith
University of California Press, 2010
PS1331.A2 2010