Many universities and colleges focus on student retention and completion as a measure of their success. Publications such as the "Chronicle of Higher Education" carry an increasing number of articles dealing with student retention, success, and completion. Academic libraries support this goal through a wide variety of services, teaching,…

What do school librarians fear most? Hands down, their biggest fear is a formal challenge to a resource in the school library. There are no accurate statistics about the number of challenges to school library resources. The staff of ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom estimates that only about 20 percent are reported to ALA annually. For the…

More than 250 authors at Utah State University published an Open Access (OA) article in 2016. Analysis of survey results and publication data from Scopus suggests that the following factors led authors to choose OA venues: ability to pay publishing charges, disciplinary colleagues' positive attitudes toward OA, and personal feelings such as…

As more students, faculty, and staff from traditionally underrepresented groups enter universities and colleges, academic libraries must find ways to reach out to these groups in order to better meet their unique educational needs. In this article, librarians from two large public universities describe how they used data about their communities to…

Looking for new way to teach high school students how to use the library and library resources? The HeLIOS (Hemingway Library Information Online Skills) tutorial, an online tool designed specifically for high school students, may be the answer. For the past two years, students at home, in classrooms, and at libraries throughout Utah have used…

The librarian for the Stevens-Henager College, Murray, Utah campus was hired in the spring of 2008 and given the task of maintaining and improving the college's library and bookstore. It was soon discovered that many areas needed improvement (processes, outreach, policies, personnel, work-flow, etc.) Fortunately, she possessed skills from previous…

"Research Library Issues" ("RLI") is a bimonthly report from ARL (Association of Research Libraries), CNI (Coalition of Networked Information), and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). This issue includes the following articles: (1) ARL Encourages Members to Refrain from Signing Nondisclosure or…

Librarians at the Stevens-Henager Career College Salt Lake City Campus have developed a library-instruction program over the last year. The basic section consists of 40-45 minutes on primary, secondary, and tertiary literature, search techniques, live online searching using student-contributed examples, finishing off with short sections on…

Gardening in the American Southwest (SW) is an extreme sport. Not only are gardeners challenged by geographic extremes from tropical deserts to subalpine locales, they must also deal with a wide range of climates. Winter in the mountains and higher regions means heavy snows, frozen soils, and temperatures that can dip below zero. In contrast,…

This article describes the Grand County Public Library (GCPL) which was awarded the 2007 Best Small Library in America, an award sponsored by "Library Journal" and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Some 4800 of Grand County, Utah's 8,826 people live in Moab and the rest in the adjacent Spanish Valley and environs. The locals are a…

At our small business college, we believe that next to serving the students, the most important thing we as librarians can do is serve as liaisons to the faculty. If the faculty is tuned in to the library, it is more likely he or she will use library resources and will teach students about them. This will provide a more effective education for the…

This article describes how librarians stepped up to the plate to rescue materials and meet the needs of thousands of uprooted evacuees from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, employing their unique skills and resources to put forth a humane and herculean effort. In Houston and Austin, Texas; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Memphis; Fayetteville, Arkansas; and…

This annual report of Utah public library services presents data useful for local library planning. This information is presented in two sections: core performance measures and general tables. Statewide summary data and breakouts by the populations of the library jurisdictions are provided for the following core performance measures: (1) visits…

This report is an evaluation of public library service in Utah from 1990 to 2000. The introduction summarizes findings; a map of public library jurisdictions is included. The report contains sections the following sections: (1) Utah's Population; (2) Circulation and Interlibrary Loan; (3) Holdings and Subscriptions; (4) Library Staff; (5) Income…

This document presents standards for Utah public libraries. The benefits of standards for public libraries and for the state library are listed, and responsibilities, benefits, and characteristics of three types of public libraries (i.e., volunteer, transitional, and certified public libraries) are summarized. Specific standards in the following…