public library

The Gale and Google Integration at Work

Posted June 13, 2016

By Holly Hibner, Adult Services Coordinator, Plymouth District Library (MI)

As libraries continually seek to be a valued educational partner in communities, schools, and institutions, bringing trustworthy digital content into the natural path of their users has never been more important. To make it easier for people to find and use this relevant, authoritative information, Gale, a part of Cengage Learning, has partnered with Google for Education in two ways: providing intuitive integration of popular workflow tools through Google Apps for Education and indexing content in Google Scholar. With more than 50 million Google Apps for Education teachers and students worldwide, and an average of over 40,000+ Google search engine queries per second, Google is indisputably the place where people get their answers.

Information is truly at our fingertips now that Gale has become a Google for Education Partner. Many of Google’s popular tools like Drive, Docs, and Classroom are now integrated with Gale’s top products. Information seekers often look to Google for answers. Now they can combine the power of Google with the content authority of Gale databases.

Read moreThe Gale and Google Integration at Work

Understanding Community Goals Leads to Success for Libraries and Communities – A post from the 2016 Library of the Year

By Leah Sewell, Communications Editor, Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library

Have you ever been on the other line of a survey call? I haven’t, personally, but I’ve often wondered if I would be a willing participant. Perhaps in the midst of a particularly juicy book, soaking up one-on-one time with my fast-growing 9-year-old or closely watching a new recipe simmer, what would compel me to answer the phone, but also to converse with a researcher for an indeterminate spell? Well, for one thing, I’d pretty much drop everything and let dinner burn to gab with any stranger, on the phone or otherwise, when the topic is libraries.

You see, in my career as the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library’s Communication Editor, I am enamored with the “public” part of the public library. How does the public feel about our services? How will they react to a minor or a major change? How can we woo them, engage them, help them feel a part the community through literacy and learning, and subsequently change their lives for the better?

My library is focused on the public and the public good. It’s asking the right questions, discovering people’s goals and needs and assisting them so they can reach them. Ultimately, it’s about making a difference in the community by working with our fellow citizens to make their lives better. That’s a good chunk of the reason why we’re the Library Journal / Gale, a part Cengage Learning 2016 Library of the Year. We have our ears to the ground.

When the 2016 Pew Research Center report, Libraries at the Crossroads, was released in September 2015, I wondered about the people on the other end of those cell phones and land lines. Those individuals that Pew cites variously as “a share of Americans” or “a majority of Americans,” or “low-income Americans” are real individuals with busy lives, loved ones and their own dinners to prepare. Yet, they all sat a spell to gab about libraries.

Read moreUnderstanding Community Goals Leads to Success for Libraries and Communities – A post from the 2016 Library of the Year

Worldmark Global Health and Medicine Issues:

a “Comprehensive” and “Informative” Resource

Posted on May 20, 2016

Searching for “very useful” information on global health and medicine issues in the modern world?  Worldmark Global Health and Medicine Issues, 1st Edition addresses health and medicine topics relevant to everyone’s lives across the globe. Organized alphabetically, the encyclopedia gives readers easy access to authoritative information on various topics.

This article was published in Booklist‘s May 15, 2016 issue; by Barbara Bibel. Read what she had to say!

CONTENT With the speed of modern travel and the global connections of commerce and industry, health issues quickly become international. This new encyclopedia does an excellent job of placing health and medical problems within social, political, and economic contexts. Using primary source documents, photographs, charts, and graphs to supplement the text, the book provides a brief but comprehensive overview of 90
topics affecting world health.

Read moreWorldmark Global Health and Medicine Issues:

a “Comprehensive” and “Informative” Resource

Histories of Everyday Life in Totalitarian Regimes – “Highly recommended. All libraries. All levels.”

Posted on April 21, 2016

Guided by a five-person advisory board of distinguished scholars, examine what life was like during the twentieth century under totalitarian rule with Histories of Everyday Life in Totalitarian Regimes, 1st Ed. This set spans multiple disciplines and holds a wealth of information for various college courses as well as high school teachers encouraging the analysis of primary and secondary sources.

This title review was recently published by Choice Reviews Online. Read what they had to say!

Read moreHistories of Everyday Life in Totalitarian Regimes – “Highly recommended. All libraries. All levels.”

The Biggest Large Print Myths Busted!

Thorndike Large Print Books Same Size!

Spoiler Alert: The large print format offers benefits for people under the age of 60 with perfectly good eyesight.

Have you ever been so good at something you’ve found yourself pigeonholed? Being typecast can feel like a mixed blessing—your claim to fame shines bright, creating the shadow in which your other great qualities hide. If large print books were people, they would feel this acutely.

No doubt, large print books are a well-known solution for visually impaired readers, and those readers are typically seniors. Unfortunately for large print, being so good at solving this one problem for this one audience has led to a narrow, and sometimes inaccurate view of the usefulness of the format overall.

We’d love to enlist the expert MythBusters Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman to explore the issue in detail, but if you’ve ever seen the Discovery Channel show, you know their mythbusting process tends to involve blowing things up, and we’d hate to see our beloved books so abused.

So, without the pyrotechnics, here are the biggest large print myths: BUSTED!

Read moreThe Biggest Large Print Myths Busted!

InfoTrac: Environmental Studies and Policy: A “Solid” and “Viable” Collection

Searching for a “solid” resource of “considerable substance” to answer inquiries about environmental concerns? Your search ends here with the InfoTrac: Environmental Studies and Policy Collection, featuring over 5.4 million articles and “more searching flexibility than that of most platforms.” Engage and support students with an easily searchable, mobile-responsive design and integrated Google Apps for Education tools.

Read a review from Library Journal, April, 2016

Read moreInfoTrac: Environmental Studies and Policy: A “Solid” and “Viable” Collection

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.

Read moreMacmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks: Religion: A “Highly Recommended” Series

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.

Read morePack Your Bags! Travel Books on GVRL

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.

Read moreBusiness Stats You Can Compare Anywhere, Anytime

Getting to Know the Business of Business

Posted on March 4, 2016

By Tina Creguer

  • Jamie is a new marketing manager for her company. She needs to find detailed information on companies in her field and get up to speed quickly about the competition.
  • Ali is graduating with his MBA with a concentration in finance in seven months. He doesn’t want to wait too long to identify potential employers. He’d like to begin to pinpoint companies in the industries that interest him most.
  • George, a veteran business analyst, has been asked to conduct a full review of a few key competitors’ revenue and forecasted growth for the president to use in an upcoming board meeting.
  • Jorge is a high school student doing a project on Fortune 500 companies in his state. He’d like to find out when the companies were founded, what they make, and where they operate.

In every case, there’s one resource that can connect patrons to the information they seek: Ward’s Business Directory.

Read moreGetting to Know the Business of Business