Southwestern Library News
Spring 2014
Aerial photos donated to SWOCC
About 15,950 color aerial photos of southern Oregon were donated to SWOCC by the Bureau of Land Management this year.
The photos were taken in 1982, 1992 and 1997, allowing scholars to compare changes in the forests and coastal landscape.
The photographs will prove valuable to SWOCC's new forestry program, as well as to those interested in coastal ecosystems.
The library is housing the set of coastal photographs taken between Florence and Port Orford, and they are available for viewing.
The coastal lands between Port Orford and the California state line are being held on the Curry Campus. Inland forest lands photographs are held in SWOCC's forestry program.
Spring brings a new, modern library catalog
You'll see a new look once you search online for a book or movie.
The new Coastline public access catalog went online countywide in March. It's a more modern, interactive website. Go to the library homepage and click on Find a book to see it.
New features: You'll see a rotating display of book covers, you can comment on books or movies, create short tags to describe a book or movie, and keep public or private lists of what you have read and seen.
You do not have to log in to use the site, but you will have to log in to place holds, make comments or create lists.
Your username is your library card barcode number. Your password is your last name in all capital letters. You can change your password to something more secure after you log on.
Free book giveaway to spark reading
Who is helping to give out a half million free books across America on April 23? We are!
Southwestern Library was selected as a distribution site for volunteers who already have been chosen to hand out novels and nonfiction in order to encourage light and reluctant readers.
About 25,000 volunteers in 6,200 communities across the nation will be handing out books April 23. Those numbers include several SWOCC staff members who were chosen as volunteer book givers for our communities. We'll be handing out books during the day.
Learn more about World Book Night at http://www.us.worldbooknight.org/
Chronicle of Higher Education Online
Use of Spanish-language databases increases through Southwestern Library
One number jumps out when looking at recent database use at SWOCC. Spanish-language databases, the multidisciplinary Fuente Academica and the health database MedicLatina, both tripled in use between 2012 and 2013.
More than 400 searches were conducted on those databases last year.
The databases only are available to SWOCC students, staff and faculty.
Poet Laureate, author, educator, pacificst, father, Oregonian
Kim Stafford, son of poet William Stafford, will speak at North Bend Public Library during this, the centennial anniversary of his father's birth. Mark your calendar for 7 p.m. May 15. It's free of charge.
The statewide Oregon Reads program and the Coos County Title Wave program this year are encouraging everyone to delve into the works of Stafford, one of our state's greatest writers. He was Poet Laureate of the United States, and he published more than 65 works of poetry and prose. Stafford was a conscientious objector during World War II.
Southwestern Library has 22 books by and about William Stafford. Come check them out!
Research on Reading
Why won't Johnny read?
One set of researchers says college students perform better in class when they do assigned reading, especially when that reading is from scholarly journals.
Yet the compliance with reading required assignments has been steadily declining for the past several decades (Bartlett Gorney, & Herschbach, 2010) . Students avoid reading assignments, and instructors don't enforce the assignments, an article in College Student Journal claims. Why so?
Here's part of the explanation from the article "Resistance to Reading Compliance among College Students: Instructors' Perspectives":
"Clump et al. (2004) have found that approximately 62% of college students feel it is the responsibility of instructors to identify important information from journal articles and relay that information to students. Clump et al. (2004) have also found that many students consider material from journal articles as second-rate information, compared to information provided in instructors' lectures and handouts."
The article on non-compliance with required reading assignments can be found here.
CITATION
Lei, S. A., Bartlett, K. A., Gorney, S. E., & Herschbach, T. R. (2010). Resistance to Reading Compliance among College Students: Instructors' Perspectives. College Student Journal, 44(2), 219-229.
Southwestern Library
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Website: www.socc.edu/library
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Phone: 541-888-7270