Predominantly black rural counties, located in the South, are among the poorest in the nation. Manufacturing has long been an important source of job growth in these counties, but the skill demands of new technology put these populations at a disadvantage. The poor quality of local schools and high dropout rates are major problems in predominantly…

Describes the organization of a regional symposium to provide a learning environment that promotes professional development of graduate engineering students and the interactive exchange of ideas among regional industries and universities. Includes a brief history of the event, goals and guidelines for hosting such a symposium, and an illustration…

U.S. jobs supported by exports are more concentrated in medium- and high-skill occupations than jobs displaced by imports, about half of which are low-skill. Exports are also linked to increasing skill requirements for workers in rural manufacturing businesses. However, long-term job creation trends show that domestic demand generates most…

Chronicles the geographic and historical locational changes of the textile industry of the U.S. South. Economics of scope, flexible production, and quality of output characterize the contemporary textile industry. Provides basic geographic content enabling a teacher to develop a unit by applying geography to interpret the past and present. (CMK)

Reviews the efforts for developing technical education in England that occurred from 1867-89, the reasons for wanting to institute technical education, and the various reasons why the call for technical education failed. Maintains that England's refusal to adopt the technical education approaches of other countries has long been regretted. (CMK)

Analyzes the ways publishers' Web sites can be used by librarians to locate additional science and technology reference materials which fall within budget constraints while meeting the needs of the patrons. Reviews specific publishers' Web sites to compare features and show how they differ. (Author/LRW)

Reports on a research project designed to develop an intelligent computer-based learning environment of industrial applications. "Jonas," an expert system, is part of a modeling/simulation environment which enables shop-floor workers to test and put new philosophies of work into practice in the context of manufacture. The approach focuses on the…

A study of the catalog holdings of all Canadian academic libraries found that fewer noncorporate publications were available than mainstream titles published by corporations and that electronic vendors provide little access to noncorporate "small publisher" titles while providing 100% access to surveyed mainstream titles. Examines the…

The National Federation of Abstracting and Information Services (NFAIS) is an organization of over 60 publishers and online service providers. Included is a formal white paper which was released in December 1997 to clarify the rights and responsibilities of each party in the electronic information delivery process: authors, publishers,…

The Institute of Physics Publishing (IPP), a subsidiary body of the Institute of Physics (IOP), has used electronic publishing on the Internet as a major means of improving the speed of dissemination of physics information. The development of the Comprehensive Electronic Journals service is described along with recent enhancements and other…

Discusses the complicated role of the published writer in academics. Suggests that the writer teaching in a university setting has a similar goal to the academic: to illuminate the human experience. Asserts that the writer undertakes this mission in a creative, unstructured way, whereas the academic does it traditionally and often as a critic.…

This study is a follow-up to a Correspondence Factor Analysis of a dataset of over six million bibliometric entries, which compared publication output patterns of 48 countries in 18 disciplines over a 12-year period (1981-1992). Several approaches to the comparison of publication output patterns and time trends are illustrated. (AEF)

Discusses new ways of selecting information for digital libraries. Topics include increasing the quantity of information acquired versus item by item selection that is more costly than the value it adds; library-publisher relationships; netLibrary; electronic journals; and the SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition)…

Discusses issues related to managing electronic resources in academic libraries from a vendor's perspective. Topics include collection development policies; format and content; decisions to buy, borrow, or link to online resources; ethics and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition); service, cost, and value; vendors'…

Despite growth in the service sector, manufacturing remains a vital part of the rural South's economic base and is related to lower poverty rates. However, manufacturing is changing, adopting new technologies and management practices, and seeking more highly skilled labor. Poor rural schools, an unskilled workforce, and absence of community…