feb07a.indd N e w s f r o m t h e F i e l d Stephanie Orphan Instruction Section announces “A Bibliography of Research Methods Texts” The ACRL Instruction Section’s Research and Scholarship Committee is pleased to announce its latest publication, “A Bib­ liography of Research Methods Texts.” The bibliography is available at www.ala. org/ala/acrlbucket/is/publicationsacrl/ researchmethods.htm. The bibliography in­ cludes nearly 50 reviews written by com­ mittee members. Each entry also includes citations to other published reviews. The bib­ liography was designed to complement the “Research Agenda for Library Instruction and Information Literacy” by providing librarians with an annotated list of texts that will help guide them throughout the research process. It includes several entries for introductory re­ search textbooks for the beginner, as well as books on specific research methods, such as quantitative analysis and focus groups. The project involved a great deal of work on the part of the 2005–2006 Research and Scholarship Committee: Alison Armstrong (Intern), Polly Boruff­Jones, Christen Cardina, Nancy Dewald, Wendy Holliday, Christopher Hollister, Merinda McLure, Anna Pilston (Chair), Mark Spasser, Terry Taylor, and Robert Withers. NEH and IMLS seek “Advancing Knowledge” applications The Institute of Museum and Library Ser­ vices (IMLS) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) are accepting ap­ plications to a new digital humanities grant competition sponsored by the two federal agencies. The new grant program, “Advanc­ ing Knowledge: The IMLS/NEH Digital Part­ nership,” seeks applications for innovative, collaborative humanities projects using the latest digital technologies for the benefi t of the American public, humanities scholar­ ship, and the nation’s cultural community. Successful projects funded through the part­ nership will explore new ways to share, ex­ amine, and interpret humanities collections in a digital environment and develop new uses and audiences for existing digital re­ sources. Grants awarded through Advanc­ ing Knowledge will bring together museum, library, archives, and IT professionals with humanities scholars to use innovative ap­ proaches in digital technology to provide new perspectives on humanities collections, offer new interpretive contexts, and allow existing resources to be widely shared. Non­ profit institutions interested in applying can find guidelines online at www.neh.gov. The deadline for applications to the Advanc­ ing Knowledge grant program is March 27, 2007, and applications must be submitted through Grants.gov. The first awards will be announced in early summer. SUNY Librarians Association working towards equity The State University of New York Librarians Association (SUNYLA), a nonprofi t organiza­ tion of SUNY librarians, has begun a drive to achieve greater equity with classroom facul­ ty. SUNY librarians were granted faculty sta­ tus in 1968, but the overwhelming majority still work calendar year contracts at below­ peer wages. The group authored a report, “Equity: A Call to Action” and unanimously passed “A Resolution in Support of Equity” at its annual conference in June 2006. The resolution “declares equality to be [our] goal, including equal contract year obliga­ tions, equal compensation, and the option of equal professorial titles . . . .” More infor­ mation about SUNYLA’s work in this arena is available on its equity blog at sunyequity. blogspot.com. NetLibrary adding eAudiobooks from Random House and Blackstone NetLibrary is now offering eAudiobook titles form Random House Audio Group and Blackstone Audio. Through its agree­ ment with Random House, NetLibrary will distribute Books on Tape, Listening Library, and Living Language titles. Books on Tape includes adult unabridged fiction and non­ fiction, Listening Library contains children’s audio books, and Living Language offers self­study foreign language programs. eAu­ diobooks from Blackstone include more C&RL News February 2007 70 http:blogspot.com http:Grants.gov http:www.neh.gov than 1,600 classic, best­selling, and award­ winning tiles. Library users will be able to search for, preview, download, and listen to audio titles through the NetLibrary plat­ form on the Internet. NetLibrary, a division of OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc., will waive access fees on the purchase of titles from both collections made before March 31, 2007. Library of Congress selects fi lms for 2006 National Film Registry The Library of Congress has selected 25 films, dating from 1913 to 1996, to add to the National Film Registry, bringing the to­ tal number of films on the registry to 450. The films on the registry represent a range of American filmmaking, including Holly­ wood features, documentaries, avant­garde and amateur productions, films of ethnic and regional interest, and animated and short film subjects. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington chose the 2006 selec­ tions after evaluating nearly 1,000 titles nominated by the public and conducting intensive discussions with the library’s mo­ tion picture division staff. Among the 25 recent additions are Applause (1929), Blaz­ ing Saddles (1974), Groundhog Day (1993), Rocky (1976), and a Time of War (1954). The complete list and additional informa­ tion about the program are available at www.loc.gov/fi lm. Dialog announces Engineering Index Backfi le Dialog has announced that it has added the Engineering Index backfile to the Dialog platform. The new archival backfi le from Engineering Information adds more than 1.7 million records going back to 1884. The archival backfile is available as part of the Ei Compendex database, which now con­ tains data from 1884 to the present. It is also available as a separate database con­ taining just the historical data from 1884 to 1969. Using the Engineering Index Backfi le, searchers can find reference to some of the most important innovations of the late­19th century and most of the 20th century. ABC-CLIO launches Issues database Reference publisher ABC­CLIO has launched a new database, Issues: Understanding Con­ troversy and Society. The database combines authoritative research sources, inquiry­based teaching and study tools, and integrated cur­ rent events aligned to social studies stan­ dards and curriculum. Researchers will fi nd information on 150 current political, social, environmental, and criminal justice topics and can approach their research by broad Register for the ACRL/Harvard Leadership Institute for Academic Librarians Registration is now open for the ACRL/ Har vard Leadership Institute for Aca­ demic Librarians. The institute will be held in Cambridge, Massachusetts, August 5–10, 2007. Registration materials are online at www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlevents /leadershipinstitute.htm, and registrations will be accepted on a fi rst­come,fi rst­served basis. ACRL is collaborating with the Harvard Institutes for Higher Education to pres­ ent the Leadership Institute for Academic Librarians. The goal of this innovative pro­ gram is to increase your capacity to lead and to manage. Throughout the institute, you will be challenged to defi ne management problems and identify and offer solutions. The institute is designed for individuals with significant administrative responsibility in an institution of higher education, and who show high promise for making a signifi cant contribution in the future, such as library directors, university librarians, and their associates and direct reports. Two scholarships are available for the 2007 ACRL/Harvard Leadership Institute. The purpose of these scholarships is to support the participation of academic and research librarians working at His­ torically Black Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges or Universities, or those employed at Hispanic Serving Institutions. The scholarship covers the cost of tuition to the institute (value $1,975). Complete details are online at www.ala.org/ala/acrl /acrlevents/leadershipinstitute.htm. February 2007 71 C&RL News www.ala.org/ala/acrl www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlevents www.loc.gov/fi reference category, subject, or single issue. the venture, which will be based in NPG’s More than 9,000 reference pieces are pro­ Cambridge Massachusetts office. Most re­ vided in the form of historical and interpre­ cently Savkar has been director of new ven­ tive essays, brief factual entries, statistical tures at Pearson Custom Publishing. data, and primary sources (photos, audiovi­ sual files, and documents). Columbia launches Carnegie Corporation oral history Web site Nature Education announced Columbia University’s Oral History Research Nature Publishing Group (NPG) has launched Office (OHRO), in partnership with the li­ Nature Education, a new venture to develop braries’ Digital Program Division and Digital innovative educational resources and tools Knowledge Ventures, has launched a new for science students and their professors. multimedia oral history Web site focusing Nature Education will take a nontraditional on the oral history of Carnegie Corpora­ approach to the rapidly evolving college ed­ tion conducted by OHRO. The site features ucation market, focusing primarily on creat­ interviews with Carnegie staff, trustees, ing leading­edge learning solutions in biol­ and grant recipients. Visitors to the site ogy, chemistry, and physics. Vikram Savkar can explore the interviews in three forms: has been appointed publishing director of streaming video, audio, and written tran­ scripts. Nearly 40 hours of interviews with 21 different Ode to an Associate Professor in the Library people are accessible on the on the Occasion of Her Promotion site. A central focus of the (with apologies to John Keats) Web site is the corporation’s work in South Africa, where I it funded legal reform and re­ search into black poverty dur­ Thou still unburnt­out paragon of librarians, ing the decades of apartheid. Thou teacher of descriptors and thesauri, Grant recipients who carried Digital Huntress! Diana among Marions! out the research and fought Who makest instructors wonder, quake and worry: apartheid in the courts de­ What honor lifts thy name above the throng tail their experiences and the Of pedants, bureaucrats, and all the nation? importance of the corpora­ On campus, and in the halls of Time? tion’s contributions. The oral What laurels grace thy brow? What celebration? histories and Web site were What recognition? Loud and cheerful song? funded by a series of grants What pipes and timbrels? What ecstatic rhyme? from Carnegie Corporation. The site is available at www. II c o l u m b i a . e d u / c u / l w e b /digital/collections/oral_hist Ah, happy, happy rank! That lifts thy name, /carnegie/. No longer to assist the professoriate, But to associate with those of Fame – NYPL provides browsing, The full professors and the poet laureate. checkout through mobile Fair youth, with lowly status, leave behind. devices Thy song for evermore must be sedate, The New York Public Li­ Sensible shoes, and somber be thy gown brary’s (NYPL) mobile ver­ When, to all who wait, thou deem to say’st, sion of eNYPL allows library “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all users to browse and check Ye know on earth—The system’s down!” out electronic materials us­ ing a wide variety of mobile Judith Stokes, Rhode Island College devices, including Blackber­ JStokes@RIC.edu ries, Web enabled Palms, Windows Mobile, and Smart­ phones. Patrons can navigate C&RL News February 2007 72 mailto:JStokes@RIC.edu through the designed­to­fit Web site that eliminates the need for exces­ sive scrolling often required to steer through sites not built for smaller screens. Among the materials in the eNYPL digital collection are more than 2,500 Mobipocket eBooks, which can be downloaded directly onto handheld devices. Also avail­ able for borrowing are more than 3,000 audiobook titles, 400 music titles, and 500 video titles. Titles cir­ culate for 21 days (eNYPL video cir­ culates for seven days), after which they expire and are no longer ac­ cessible. The eNYPL collection is licensed through OverDrive, Inc., a Cleveland­based company that specializes in managing distribution of digitized content utilizing digital rights management (DRM) technology to publishers, retailers, and libraries. Wayne State LIS program assumes responsibility for archival administration curriculum The Wayne State University Library and Information Science (LIS) Program has as­ sumed direction of the archival administra­ tion graduate certifi cate program, which had formerly been part of the Walter P. Reuther Library and Archives. The LIS Program is now recruiting for a new faculty position with responsibility for the archival admin­ istration courses. The curriculum in archival administration leads to a graduate certifi cate in archival administration and was estab­ lished for individuals entering the archival profession as well as those with experience in the field. Students working concurrently on the master’s of library and information science (MLIS) degree may also earn the certificate in archival administration but are required to complete an additional six cred­ its beyond the 36 required for the MLIS de­ gree. Currently there are approximately 40 students enrolled in the archival administra­ tion certificate program. Thomson Scientific to provide key science data to NSF study Thomson Scientific has announced that it is supplying key journal literature information to the Patent Board for a study of scientifi c I can’t live without . . . I love lii.org. The quality of all the selected Web sites is excellent and it impresses upon the students that it is important to be selective when doing college research. It also teaches students that people are behind the directories, and in this case, professional librarians. The way in which the categories are arrayed also helps students who haven’t decided on a topic.—Susan Rosenberg, Brookdale Community College . . .Librarian’s Internet Index lii.org research trends. The National Science Foun­ dation (NSF) recently awarded a contract to the Patent Board to develop key science metrics, and the Patent Board is using jour­ nal literature information from Thomson Scientific, in the form of Science Citation Index and Social Sciences Citation Index, in compiling its study. The two databases form part of ISI Web of Knowledge, Thomson’s research platform for the sciences, social sci­ ences, arts, and humanities. NSF contracted the Patent Board to analyze the strength of both U.S. and international science and en­ gineering output. The Patent Board will be analyzing vast amounts of scientific data to develop indicators that measure trends in worldwide scientific research. The results will be published in NSF’s biennial Science and Engineering Indicators, beginning in 2008. Correction In the November issue of C&RL News, credit given to Jason Griffey for photos used in the article “Experience ACRL’s Immersion Program” (p. 631) inadver­ tently gave his institution as Univer­ sity of Texas­Chattanooga. Griffey is actually reference and instructional technology librarian at University of Tennessee­Chattanooga. The editors regret the error. February 2007 73 C&RL News