USF in Lakeland Library

The data from the 2005 Journal Citation Reports is now available in the ISI Web of Knowledge database. This data gives information on how many times a journal was cited, how many it has cited other journals and it’s impact factor, among others.

This kind of information is interesting when you are choosing a journal to submit an article, or when you are collecting additional information for a tenure and/or promotion dossier.

Two of the ABC-Clio databases available at USF, Historical Abstracts and America: History and Life will present enhanced interfaces starting tomorrow June 22.
This new version 4.1 features will include:

• Cross-database searching between Historical Abstracts and America: History and Life
• Faster, smarter searching, including: suggested terms for searches that return no results; inverted author names; punctuation alternatives and dynamic search tips
• Ability for users to save search histories to a personal profile
• Enhanced search capability for time period searches that includes individual years and spans of years
• Ability for users to build a set of tagged records across multiple searches
• A display option for expanding all of a user’s search result records at once
• Addition of a “print-this-entry” option for each record in a search results display
• Ability to easily limit searches to English language entries only
• OpenURL-support for book entries in the Historical Abstracts database

The ACM Digital Library, specializing in computer science, will be down for maintenance today starting at 4:00 PM. The service should be restablished within 12 hours.

To be notified when the service will be back up, enter your email address on the ACM website.

I will be at a conference from Monday, June 12th to Thursday, June 15th. I will be back on Friday, June 16th.

If you need immediate assistance, you can use the Ask-A-Librarian services or, for a short, factual question, use the PCC/USF Library.

ISI Web of Knowledge (which you may know better as the platform to Web of Science) has announced enhancements:

• Easier refinement of results, one category at a time
• Greater amount of results that can be analyzed with the Analyze function, up to 100,000 at a time.

I am of course available to guide through Web of Science but online training is also available with seminars or short, recorded sessions.

On Monday, May29th, the PCC/USF Library will be closed for Memorial Day.

Thursday, May 25th and Friday May 26th: I will be absent this afternoon and tomorrow morning. I will return Friday, May 26, around 12:00 PM. If you need immediate assistance, you can use the Ask-A-Librarian services or, for a short, factual question, use the PCC/USF Library.

Wednesday, May 24th, I will be in Tampa all day for meetings. If you need immediate assistance, you can use the Ask-A-Librarian services or, for a short, factual question, use the PCC/USF Library.

Good news! A operating fund for the Lakeland Library Services was created at the USF Foundation. That means that donations for the benefit of the library services here can be made. This fund does not yet appear on the Give Online! system but should soon. You can contact me for more information.

Meanwhile, USF employees interested in contributing to the Lakeland Library Operating Fund for the 2006 Faculty and Staff Charitable Campaign, can do so on a paper contribution form. I have paper forms, as does Drs Ponticell and Lamm. The Fund number is LL0001.

The National Council on Teacher Quality made a report public today entitled “What Education Schools Aren’t Teaching About Reading–and What Elementary Teachers Aren’t Learning”.

NCTQ studied a large representative sampling of ed schools to find out what future elementary teachers are–and are not–learning about reading instruction. The report, the most comprehensive of its kind, determined that education schools are ignoring the principles of good reading instruction that would prepare prospective teachers how to better teach reading.

You can either access the Executive Summary or the full text.