Christmas Fine Amnesty

Do you owe fines to the Library?

You can help rebuild congregational libraries damaged by Hurricane Katrina!

Church and synagogue library organizations across North America are joining forces to ensure a future for congregational libraries damaged by Hurricane Katrina. The National Church Library Association, the Church & Synagogue Library Association and the Catholic Library Association together have established a relief fund to help rebuild affected library ministries.

For each 25 cents you donate, the Library will waive $2.00 worth of fines. Please note that the Fine Amnesty does not apply to lost book charges.

*This program will run through Friday, December 16.*

Thanksgiving Week Hours

Here are the Library's hours for the rest of the week and the weekend:

Tuesday, November 22: 8am - Midnight

Wednesday, November 23: CLOSED

Thursday, November 24: CLOSED

Friday, November 25: CLOSED

Saturday, November 26: 10am- 2pm

Sunday, November 27: Noon - Midnight

Happy Thanksgiving!

Lexis/Nexis Databases

Lexis/Nexis is well-known for providing news and legal information, but it also has several excellent databases. Here are a few:

Accounting Literature consists of 18 accounting sources, including journals and other literature.

Disclosure Reports contains business and financial information extracted from annual and periodic reports filed with the Securities an Exchange Commission for over 10,000 publicly-owned companies. A real strength of this database is the financial ratios calculated for each company.

Roper Center for Public Opinion Research provides access to the Public Opinion Poll, the most comprehensive full-text collection of public opinion in the United States. It covers the full spectrum of public interest including politics and government, public institutions, international relations, business, social affairs and consumer behavior and preferences.

Christmas Fine Amnesty

Do you owe fines to the Library?

You can help rebuild congregational libraries damaged by Hurricane Katrina!

Church and synagogue library organizations across North America are joining forces to ensure a future for congregational libraries damaged by Hurricane Katrina. The National Church Library Association, the Church & Synagogue Library Association and the Catholic Library Association together have established a relief fund to help rebuild affected library ministries.

For each 25 cents you donate, the Library will waive $2.00 worth of fines. Please note that the Fine Amnesty does not apply to lost book charges.

*This program will run from Monday, November 28 through Friday, December 16.*

Google Print - Preserving Public Domain Books

Google is now making a number of public domain books available online via Google Print. A public domain book was never subject to copyright or has an expired copyright and can therefore be made readily available to the public.

In Google Print, you can view entire pages of books and and also search the entire text.

Read more about it in Google's blog.

Peter Drucker

Peter Drucker, the man known as the father of modern management, died at the age of 95 on Friday. The Library owns more than 30 of his books, but a good introduction to his thoughts can be found in:

The Essential Drucker

or

Peter Drucker on the Profession of Management

New Book/DVD List - October 2005

The list of new books and DVDs added to the Library collection in October has been released.

Langston Hughes - The November Monthly Book Spotlight

The November installment of the Monthly Book Spotlight has been added to the Library's web site. Reference Librarian Kristine Kasbohm writes about The Collected Works of Langston Hughes.

Email Question Response Rate

Introduction

The Library sought to assess this performance indicator:

"When the Library is open, reference librarians will respond to email questions within two hours."

Methodology

From September 2, 2005 through October 16, 2005, the Library Director sent 26 emails on different times and on different days to the reference email account, noting the time and asking the reference librarian to respond.

Findings

100% of the responses were within two hours. Response times ranged from 1 minute to 81 minutes. The mean response time was 31 minutes and the median response time was 27 minutes.

Measures to Take

None. The reference librarians met the goal described in the performance indicator.

Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks became a civil rights pioneer when she refused to give her bus seat to a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama on December 1, 1955. She died on October 24, 2005, and her funeral is today.

If you are interested in learning more about her life, consider borrowing the book Rosa Parks by Douglas Brinkley.

Please note: if the book is checked out, you can place a hold on it. You will be notified when it is returned.

Excellence in Customer Service Award - Fall 2005

Congratulations to Charles Dabkowski, Head of Acquisitions/Periodicals, for being named the Fall 2005 recipient of the Niagara University Library Excellence in Customer Service Award. Charles was recognized for "reference desk service beyond the call of duty."