Give Your Job Search a Boost Using GVRL

Posted on March 24, 2016

Originally posted in November 2015 by Henrietta Verma of Library Journal

Job seekers are some of your library’s most frequent users. They all seek the same goal—satisfying employment, quickly—but they have varying skills, educational levels, and different needs. One may need a part time job while his children are at school, for example, while another may be seeking leads on a high-level corporate position. Still others will be looking for internships and volunteer work that will enhance their résumé while they seek paying work. Among the thousands of books available on GVRL are many for those seeking a new job or a career change. See below for links to just a few of the relevant titles.

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Equip Students for National Poetry Month

 

Posted on March 22, 2016

By Candy Jones-Guerin

April 2016 marks the 20th anniversary of National Poetry Month.  Started in 1996 by the Academy of American Poets, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world.  Each year schools, publishers, libraries, booksellers and poets take time in April to celebrate how poetry has shaped our world and cultures.

Let’s begin the celebration with some of these great Gale resources.

Encyclopedia of American Poetry, 2nd Edition
December 2016
Encyclopedia of American Poetry, Second Edition is an indispensable guide to American poetry with more than 1,100 entries, ranging in length from 500 to more than 3,500 words. Part of the Companion to Literature series, this updated and invaluable resource explores the various writers, works, themes, and movements of this intriguing literary genre.

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Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks: Religion: A “Highly Recommended” Series

Looking for a resource to effectively engage and educate users in the study of religion? The Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbook on Religion: Sources, Perspectives & Methodologies combines features of an introductory textbook with those of a reference resource to encourage students in studying religion. There are ten volumes in total, that identify different areas of critical thought and practice in the study of religion, the series is “commended for community libraries” as well as “college students.”

Read a review on Volume 1, Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbook on Religion: Sources, Perspectives & Methodologies, posted by Library Watch, March, 2016.

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8 reasons to check out The Telegraph Historical Archive, 1855-2000

Published on March 16 , 2016

By Bethany Dotson

We decided to celebrate the upcoming release of The Telegraph Historical Archive, 1855-2000 with a list designed to help you decide if you should look into this brand new resource.

You may not want to miss this historical never-before-digitized collection if…

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Pack Your Bags! Travel Books on GVRL

Posted on March 16, 2016

Originally posted in December 2015 by Henrietta Verma of Library Journal

Travel books are popular with those who are actually starting to pack their bags as well as armchair voyagers. Either way, the library’s travel collection has to be kept up to date, and that can be expensive and time consuming. GVRL offers a great alternative: an online selection of travel titles for locations nearby and far-flung, and you’ll never have to weed the shelf. Titles include books for various kinds of travelers, from backpackers to families with children.

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Earth Day 2016: What will you be studying?

Posted on March 16, 2016

By Candy Jones-Guerin

Earth Day is the largest secular observance in the world, celebrated by more than a billion people every year. March 20th marks a day of action to encourage changes in human behavior and provoke policy change for our planet.

Schools across the world will be talking to their students about our precious resources and encouraging them to think about how to care for their future.  Will you be joining the conversation?

Here are some recent titles to help you get the conversation started:

Projects with Recycling and Reusing, 1st Edition
March 2016
Readers will learn how to care for their environment as they make all sorts of fun crafts with supplies that can be found around the house. See how to make a bird feeder from a milk carton, a pocket pouch from cloth, musical shares from plastic bottles which are just a few of the projects you’ll find. In addition they will learn important facts about conversation and waste with insightful text and engaging photos.

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Which (Potentially Unknown) American Novel will Inspire Your Research?

Posted March 15, 2016

By Bethany Dotson

American Fiction, 1774-1920, released this week from Gale, brings over 17,750 titles to digital life – which is an astounding number. If you read two of these books every minute and didn’t stop to sleep or eat, it would still take you more than 6 days to read through the full collection. The content from 1774-1900 is based on Lyle H Wright’s famous American Fiction: A Contribution Toward a Bibliography, the most comprehensive bibliography of American adult fiction during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and includes both well-known authors (Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, etc) and the obscure.

Luckily, all of these titles are fully indexed and full-text searchable, and the metadata and data are available for text and data mining and other forms of large-scale digital humanities analysis, making it possible to unearth new insight from this large body of work.

To give you a brief idea of what you might find—and to provide some inspiration—we’ve randomly selected a year (1860) and highlighted six very different novels, those published between  Abraham Lincoln being selected as the Republican presidential candidate and South Carolina seceding from the United States Union.

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Fact-Checking Movie “History”with Gale Resources

Posted on March 14, 2016

By Traci Cothran

I love the way movies inspired by historical events bring the past so vividly to life, especially for students who have never heard of these past events or notable people. But sometimes films stray from the facts in favor of presenting a stronger cinematic experience. I watched “Race” – the story about Jesse Owens and the 1936 Olympics – and wondered what was factual and what was “movie magic.” Students can use their brains and fingertips to search Gale databases –  like U.S. History In Context, Students Resources In Context, and Research In Context – to find out the truth, by investigating the following:

  • Following Jesse Owens’ gold medal wins, did Hitler shake Owens’ hand? (Bonus question: Did US President FDR ever welcome Owens to the White House?)
  • Were Owens and other African-American students allowed to live in student housing at Ohio State University?
  • Did German athlete Luz Long mark the takeoff area to help Owens qualify for the long jump?
  • Was that part in the movie where Owens had a romance with another woman (not his future wife) during college factual?
  • Did Owens capture 4 world records within 45 minutes at the 1935 Big Ten Track & Field Championship?
  • Why were US sprinters Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller scratched from the 4 x 100 event?

Read moreFact-Checking Movie “History”with Gale Resources

Business Stats You Can Compare Anywhere, Anytime

Posted on March 14, 2016

By Tina Creguer

Jay, a brash, young entrepreneur in the competitive field of mobile gaming app development, is putting the finishing touches on his business plan.  He already has appointments with potential investors, and he’s scurrying to pull together all the information they’ll grill him on.  Foremost on their minds will be viability of this new business and understanding the competitive landscape. He knows who his major competitors are, but needs help finding consistent data that will help him compare market share and descriptions.

There’s good news for Jay, and for anyone searching for comparative business stats.

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HOW RESEARCH PARTNERS DEMONSTRATE THE IMPORTANCE OF TODAY’S LIBRARY

Published on March 11, 2016   To illustrate how Gale, a part of Cengage Learning, bridges the librarian-faculty gap, we worked with Thomson Reuters on a State of Innovation article to show how librarians can facilitate academic collaboration. In the article Sarah Tanksalvala, a copywriter at Thomson Reuters, shares Thomson Reuters’s ideas as well as … Read more