Reference librarians often encounter "instrument seekers," library users who need to find a complete psychosocial test, scale, or questionnaire to use or adapt for research or clinical use. This article focuses on the resources that can help to answer these types of questions. Reference books, monographs, journal articles, and online…

Library services to Native Americans have expanded greatly in the past several decades, but more work still needs to be done to provide for the information needs of Native Americans. Data from the U.S. Current Population Survey were used to compare library use rates of Native American households to rates of Anglo households. Results show that…

This article reports the results from a national survey of experiences in postsecondary education of students with visual impairments in gaining access to textbooks. Participants were members of listserves sponsored by the student affiliates of the American Council of the Blind and the National Federation of the Blind. While the majority of…

This article discusses the importance of designing a library media center that engages students in constructing new knowledge. The author describes the planning stages of a new library facility. In the early planning stages, the author focused on the expectations of the administration. She soon realized that they had included all the…

As America entered the information age, libraries were no longer being pictured as a vital part of family life. Instead, technology became the critical resource for a middle-class family. In addition, state and national accountability and assessment initiatives forced school library media specialists (SLMSs) to demonstrate that the school library…

While the need for a data retention policy is rapidly becoming clear to schools, little guidance is available for crafting one. Most schools depend on backup and recovery plans that generally focus on individual servers or devices. However, retention policies also need to focus on the type of data contained on those servers and how it will be…

The study describes the methodology of a comparative citation analysis, discusses the results of its application to the analysis of published works and student theses at a single research university and evaluates the findings as a background for the management of a university library collection.

Promoting services is a conundrum for any organization. This is especially true for an academic library promoting distance library services. Systems thinking, process mapping, team learning, and diffusion of information practices offer ways of thinking about promoting services that help those involved find novel ways to approach promoting distance…

From the ascendance of the reference database and web sites offering endless opportunities for cyber-promotion to the crowds swarming through the doors to avail themselves of new computers, the Internet has transformed the way public libraries do business. That is not news. What is exciting, though, is how the Internet continues to change public…

For years, patrons have been able to access library services from home and in the library building, but in the world of Google, Yahoo, YouTube, MySpace, and Facebook, library web sites and catalogs are too often not the first place people go to look for information. The innovative use of toolbars could change this. Toolbars have been popular for…

As blogging software has grown increasingly user-friendly, many libraries are employing blogs to make their web presence as inviting and interactive as their bricks-and-mortar counterpart. Libraries are reaping the rewards, too: well-written, frequently updated public blogs help librarians relate to their patrons, generate support for new building…

Twenty-three scholarly papers and twelve abstracts comprise the content of the eleventh annual Brick and Click Libraries Symposium, held at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, Missouri. The peer-reviewed proceedings, authored by academic librarians and presented at the symposium, portray the contemporary and future face of…

Because they're quick and fun to read, riddles can "hook" even reluctant readers and keep them coming back for more. Riddles also improve vocabulary, comprehension, and oral reading; enhance deductive and inductive thinking skills; and promote libraries as places for fun. Drawing on her work with children in schools and public libraries, Dee…

Issues 256 through 265 of "Fast Facts" from the Library Research Service present data collected from libraries in Colorado and throughout the nation. Topics addressed in these "Fast Facts" from 2008 include computer usage by public library patrons, Colorado summer reading programs, children's' use of public libraries, and the…

Recovery of significant achievements by exemplary individuals and institutions in public education and librarianship informs our present understanding and motivates future efforts. This narrative history recounts some of the struggles and successes of a great city library when the very conception of a free, public library was still being defined.…