Join the Library Focus Group! Win more prizes!!

The Web site Survey is now closed, but you can still win prizes from the Library!

We are looking for Kirkwood students to participate in a focus group to evaluate the new library homepage. We know you’re busy, so in return for 1 hour of your time, we will give you a $10 gift certificate for the Kirkwood Bookstore. Participants will be chosen based on availability.

Focus groups will be held at both the Main Campus and the Iowa City Campus. Complete the form found here: http://www.kirkwood.edu/site/index.php?p=25886, if you are interested in participating.

Survey Closed – Thank you!

The Library Web site Survey is now closed. Thanks to all who responded. Despite conducting the survey during summer session, we received over 125 responses! The drawing for prizes will be held on Wednesday and winners will be notified via the email address they provided.

Thanks again for helping us improve our Web site!

Summer Hours at the Library

Summer hours at the Cedar Rapids campus Library:

• Monday-Thursday: 7:30 AM – 9 PM
• Friday: 7:30 AM – 5 PM
• Saturday and Sunday: Closed

Summer hours at the Iowa City campus Library:

• Monday-Thursday: 8 AM – 8 PM
• Friday: 8 AM – 5 PM
• Saturday and Sunday: Closed

Stop in and see us!

Take the Library Website Survey! – Win Prizes!

We need your help! The library wants to consolidate our three websites into one and we want your input about the design. Take the survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Tef0s6fA_2fjUh8WCJasXrOA_3d_3d, provide us with your contact information, and your name will be entered in a drawing for one of three fabulous prizes!
1st Place - 2 GB Flash Drive
2nd Place - Earbuds
3rd Place - Coffee mug

Another FREE H1N1 resource

Gale has also given us free access to their H1N1 resources.  There is information on the science and history of H1N1 as well as global news on the topic. This information is available at http://www.gale.cengage.com/flu/.

H1N1 Flu Resources

Due to the recent outbreak of H1N1 flu, EBSCOhost has provided the Kirkwood library with free access to the H1N1 Flu topic on their DynaMed database. This resource contains important information about prevention and screening, causes and risk factors, as well as treatments. You can access this information at http://www.ebscohost.com/dynamed/swineflu/.

Successful Remote Research Workshop

Kirkwood librarian Steve Sickels is offering a new 50 minute workshop for Kirkwood Distance Learning students called “Successful Remote Research“.

It is a presentation for distance learning students of online access to Kirkwood’s hosted library research databases demonstrating the following:

• Approach the finding of supporting materials using various books, video, periodical databases and the internet
• Obtaining immediate full text, downloads and interlibrary loan materials
• Illustrate the narrowing of a topic, the transition to controlled vocabulary and the recursive nature of research
• Address evaluation and citation of resources

Students can best utilize this presentation by trying out the information and attending the next week’s session and noting othe distance learning students’ questions and experiences.

The workshop will be held during the activity hour (11 – 11:50 AM) on Tuesday, February 10th in KTS 1 classroom.  The follow-up workshop will be held during the activity hour (11 – 11:50 AM) on Tuesday, February 17th in KTS 1 classroom.

If you can’t make it this month, don’t worry, Steve will offer the workshop again on March 24th and 31st (same times and locations).

Kirkwood Libraries now on Facebook!

The Kirkwood Libraries are reaching out to our users with new Facebook pages for our Cedar Rapids and Iowa City campus locations.

Kirkwood Community College Library – Cedar Rapids

Kirkwood Community College Library – Iowa City

The features on these pages include our Ask a Librarian! chat widget, links to this blog, links to the library account on del.icio.us, a WorldCat search box and CiteMe, an application that creates formatted citations for you!

So check us out on Facebook and become a FAN!

More new databases

It’s research paper time!  For those of you who prefer to do your research online, the library has added more new databases to its growing collection:

Wilson Web Databases

• Current Issues: Reference Shelf Plus – provides full-text articles from key publications covering a variety of current social, scientific, health, political, and global issues.
• Current Issues: Health – provides full-text article from key publications covering a variety of health issues.
• Library Literature & Information Science Full-Text – delivers full-text articles cover to cover from over 100 select library publications.
• Science Full-Text, Select Edition – covers some 320 science journals with full-text articles, indexing and abstracts

Gale Database

• Literature Resource Center – provides information on literary figures from all time periods writing in such genres as fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, history, journalism, and more.

If you need help searching or for off-campus access, please Ask a Librarian!

New Reference Database!

The Kirkwood Community College Library continues to put your money to good use with the purchase of a new database: Credo Reference.

Credo Reference provides online access full-text articles from 150 reference titles, including specialized dictionaries, encyclopedias, handbooks, guidebooks, thesauri, atlases and chronologies.  Credo’s advanced search allows researchers to search within specific subjects, book types, book titles and entry types.  For visual learners, there is an excellent concept mapping feature.

So, the next time you need to do some research, check out Credo and let us know what you think!