Data and statistics can express a point powerfully and succinctly, if used and presented responsibly.  The UN offers a vast amount of data on international issues stretching from economic to health and environmental concerns.  Take a look at the UN’s own data bank for statistics, UNdata, that searches across offices and resources and offers a rich collection of 60 million records.

Numbers by themselves tell us a lot, but place them in relational context, and suddenly, with a quick glance you can compare across regions, at the blink of an eye you can pick up on trends.  Gapminder is a cool website that allows you to make your own charts with UN data, so dynamic that you can trace the change of your chart over a specific time frame.  Go into Gapminder world, choose an x- and y- axis from the drop-down menu, and play around.  I’ll only warn you that it’s so interesting, you might just get addicted to the data!

More and more often, college professors around the country are assigning new projects instead of a traditional research paper.  We recently had a Social Problems class in the library that were developing 2-3 minute viral advertisements to promote awareness on a specific social issue or problem.  Doing multimedia projects can be fun, but it comes with all kinds of new rules and responsibilities for using, adapting, and distributing information.  Did you know, for instance, that the production of any work of any kind, whether it be a snapshot, a term paper, or even a doodle, is copyrighted the moment it’s produced?  That means it’s FULLY protected against others taking, adapting, and republishing it — including you, even for a school project.  Fortunately, there are also sites out there that are willing and eager to make their content free for the taking and/or the adapting – mostly under a Creative Commons license.  Check out our Library Toolkit about finding multimedia resources for adaptation, and watch this video from the Creative Commons site that explains the restrictions of copyright and the benefits of using Creative Commons.  It’s incredibly important in this day and age to become a responsible user of information, but we also need to become responsible producers.  As you develop multimedia projects, think about sharing your own content under a creative commons license, too!

The library will once again be open 24/7 during finals week so that you have a place to study for that scary exam when your adrenaline is pumping at 2 a.m. the night (eer…morning) before.  Back by popular demand, this service launched last spring and continued through the fall.

We’re also offering a new service that will allow groups of two or more to reserve group study rooms between the hours of 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. during finals week.  Be sure and coordinate with your group members – we need at least two names to call it a legitimate reservation.  So if you’re meeting for a brainstorming session with classmates and want a nook all your own, sign up now by visiting the Information Desk, or calling 610.660.1904.

Good luck with finals, and we’ll see you at the library!

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The new library Events and Exhibits page was recently launched to keep you updated on the things we’re planning, and the exhibits we’re showcasing in the library.  Linked directly from the library’s homepage, we’ll be advertising book talks, discussion groups, faculty presentations, and community displays that we’re organizing in the library.  Take a look, and join us for our first advertised event on April 23 at 3:30 in the library cafe as history professor Katherine Sibley discusses her new book, First Lady Florence Harding: Behind the Tragedy and Controversy.  She’ll stay to answer questions and sign copies!

Thanks to Marian Courtney and Sarah Bolce for their hard work in maintaining the Events and Exhibits site!

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Today is the only day in the year when major companies and news organizations like Google, Youtube and UK’s The Guardian could get away with some seriously wacky hoaxes.  Take a look at some of the featured ‘fools’ jokes from this year at http://aprilfoolsdayontheweb.com/, or browse through the all-time best in the age of large-scale media at http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/aprilfool/.   While it’s pretty obvious that these are jokes, they do show us that even things published by a major company should be given a second look.  No foolin’.

Thanks to Kris Mudrick for sending over these sites!

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Have you ever gone from one library database to the next in search for the perfect resource, and wished that the library could offer you a single interface to search all those resources, all at once?  Well, now we do offer such an interface!  The library recently unveiled a new tool that allows you to search across numerous library resources all at once: One Search.   While not all databases are searchable in the One Search system, there are enough to get you started doing research on just about any topic.  We will be publishing search interfaces in One Search for each individual subject on the Research by Subject page in the next few months, so stay tuned!  In the meantime, try out our Multisubject search, linked from the library’s homepage, or search across a particular subject’s One search interface by going to the One Search homepage.  Check out what databases are included in the system, and read up on the One Search FAQ’s for more information.

Best of luck with your research projects, and be sure and let us know what you think of the new system!

Throughout the month of March, Francis A. Drexel Library will host an exhibit of sample pieces from the 2008 Mordechai Anielewicz Creative Arts Competition. Named for the heroic teenager who organized Jewish resistance and gave his life fighting in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, this annual competition provides students in grades 7-12 in all public, private and parochial schools in Philadelphia and its suburbs, with both a forum and opportunity to respond to the Holocaust by means of creative expression. Panels of judges with expertise in various creative disciplines evaluate the 400 or so submissions. The artistic submissions are mounted and exhibited professionally by the Moore College of Art and Design. All of the winning written submissions are published in a booklet and distributed at the awards ceremony which is held each spring at Moore, in conjunction with the exhibition. For more information, contact Anne Krakow, Associate Director for Public Services and Programming, akrakow@sju.edu or x1906.

With the onslaught of new forms of media ushered in by fast-evolving technologies and the growth of the internet, the world of print is changing rapidly.  Magazines are discussing the doomsday prophesies of the book industry, as smaller publishers get gobbled up by large conglomerate companies interested mostly in the bottom line (this article from the magazine New York lays out the tumultuous road the book industry faces).  Newspapers are commenting on the demise of the magazine (check out this cool graphic from the New York Times that shows the number of ad pages plummeting for some mags), and bloggers are announcing that the age of the newspaper is drawing to a close (this blog entry is one among many).   As publishing drastically changes in the new information economy, libraries do try and keep up, and it is no stretch to say that the libraries of the future will look drastically different than the ones of the past.   Yet, as of now, we need to remember that projections and predictions aren’t the same as reality — we’ll continue to collect print materials as long as there are important print materials published.  And let’s hope that the really quality materials will be skillful enough to adapt to new markets and new readers!

Thanks to Cynthia Slater for the New York Times graphic!

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The faculty here at SJU work hard every year to research, write and publish on important topics across the disciplines.  Come and join us in congratulating them on the fruits of their labors at our Faculty Scholars event, and the opening of the Faculty Scholars exhibit, tomorrow from 3-5 p.m. on the second floor of the Drexel Library.    An opening by President Father Lannon and the Provost, Dr. Brice Wachterhauser, will be followed by presentations from four faculty members who will talk about the projects they’ve worked on and the things that they’ve published in 2008.   The exhibit and presentations will feature not only journal articles and books, but also creative works or projects that professors have been apart of.   Come get the scoop on what your professors do outside of the classroom!

The program will include presentations by:

Susan Fenton, Assistant Professor, Photography

John Neiva, Assistant Professor, International Business

Thomas Donahue, Professor, Foreign Language and Literature

Melissa Goldthwaite, Associate Professor, English

Because of ever-expanding markets and new possibilities for collaboration, studying business nowadays often means thinking internationally.  Knowing the right ways to approach a culture, both in everyday interactions and within businesses, can make you either a success within a new cultural environment, or sink you for not having properly investigated the ins and outs of a society that’s new to you.  The Kwintessential Business Etiquette Guide can start you on the right track for a myriad of different countries.   Their country profiles will get you familiarized with the basics with information on customs, values and cultural practices.  The doing business guides go a bit more specific into business etiquette, and introductory language phrases in numerous languages will help you begin the steps of building communication.  They even have some fun videos on business etiquette for different cultures.

Check out these and other resources on the Library Toolkits pages on Global Business Strategy and Italian Business World and its Languages.

Thanks to Cindy Slater for compiling these pages and recommending these resources!