It’s OK to order things OnDemand!

When you run across an article in your research that is available through “Get It Now” or “OnDemand,” don’t let that stop you from getting the article you need.

These terms mean that Hamersly doesn’t have access to the journal that published the article you are looking for, but we can still get the article for you. In order to get access, you will go through a short process – since the library pays (on average around $30) each time an article is viewed through the Articles OnDemand provider’s website, we want to make sure you actually want the article. We budget for Articles OnDemand use though, so we want you to use it when you need it! We simply ask that you:

Read the abstract of each article to determine how likely it is to suit your needs before viewing the full text and incurring charges.
Be sure to save the article somewhere you will be able to get back to it (e.g. your H:/ drive, My Documents folder on your personal computer, a USB drive) so that the library only pays for it once.

Happy researching!

One more reason to plan ahead when researching

There are two systems through which WOU students, faculty, and staff can obtain books from other libraries that we don’t have in Hamersly: Summit and Interlibrary Loan. What does this mean for you? It’s a matter of time: Summit items get to you in 3-5 days, while Interlibrary Loan items take longer, sometimes up to two weeks.

Summit logo Summit is the shared catalog and borrowing system of the Orbis Cascade Alliance, a consortium of academic libraries in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. This special partnership makes it faster for us to borrow items from Summit libraries and for this reason, it is used to request most books, videos, and CDs that WOU does not own. Interlibrary Loan, consisting of all libraries except the Summit libraries, is used to request articles from journals and any books, videos, and CDs not available in Summit libraries.

The moral of the story? If WOU doesn’t have what you need, request through Summit when possible. If requesting through Interlibrary Loan is your only option, just be aware that it will likely take longer than you’re used to with Summit. No matter what system, however, the library can almost always get you what you need!

Streamlined Summit Requesting

Summit logo You may remember that last summer, Hamersly Library migrated to a new system, Primo. Our library was part of the third cohort of the Orbis Cascade Alliance’s shared library system project. Now that the final cohort has migrated, we are now ready roll out an enhancement to the Summit requesting process.

Currently the Primo link “Request item (about 5 days)” moves you to another system, summit.worldcat.org, to handle the request. Even when you’ve signed in on Primo, you have to authenticate again on the requesting server.
Starting next Tuesday, Jan. 20, Primo will handle requesting as well as discovery. Fewer authentication prompts for you, and Primo’s My Account area will display the status of your requests alongside your loans, saved queries, and e-Shelf collections.

What do you need to do?

Probably nothing except to enjoy the better process. Hooray! Just a few things to consider:

Do you have links in Moodle, browser bookmarks, citation management software, etc. to records on the summit.worldcat.org server? (or to our old catalog server, library.wou.edu?). They will need to be changed to link to the Primo server. (See Get the URL for a Primo record.)

Likewise, if you have linksto the general search page summit.worldcat.org, change to the new search URL:

https://alliance-wou.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/search?vid=01ALLIANCE_WOU:WOU

While the Summit group within WorldCat is going away, WorldCat in the larger sense remains a valid resource to discover and request items that are beyond the holdings of the Summit libraries, through Interlibrary Loan. Please continue to find the link to WorldCat in the bottom right corner of the Primo Search box on the library’s main page.

You can learn more about the system, see video tutorials and screenshots, and share comments and questions at our Primo Guide.

Most popular books of 2014

January book display Interested in what the WOU community was reading for fun last year? Looking for a good book to dive into before classes get busy? Check out our new display showcasing the most popular books of the past year from Hamersly’s Recreation Collection: from thrillers like Gone Girl to series sensations like The Hunger Games to nonfiction explorations of mental health and military history.

The display is located on the first floor of the library between rooms 108 and 107, and the rest of the Recreation Collection is on the other end of the first floor.

“Can I send someone to check out those books?”

We often get asked if a family member, friend, or graduate assistant can pick up materials on behalf of a borrower. Our system now makes it easier for us to manage these requests by documenting a borrower’s proxy. As a Hamersly Library patron, you may grant permission for another person (or persons) to check out materials from the library on your account.

Proxies can pick up materials that arrive for you through Summit and Interlibrary Loan, and Hamersly-owned items that are on hold for you.

You can designate a proxy for just a few days, to accommodate an illness perhaps, or longer term, for continued access–it’s up to you.

Call for submissions

The Program for Undergraduate Research (PURE) invites you to submit your work to Western Oregon University’s peer-reviewed undergraduate research journal: PURE Insights.

The submission deadline is December 31, 2014.

Students and recent graduates (with a faculty mentor) can submit original research and creative work including technical papers, research articles, expository articles, poems, short stories, photographs, videos, and other creative works from all academic disciplines. All submissions to the journal must have a faculty sponsor. [wpspoiler name=”Learn more”]

Here are three reasons to submit your paper:

It looks great on resumes. A publication in a peer-reviewed journal will make you stand out from other candidates applying for jobs or graduate school.
Going through the process of research – from drafting ideas to publication – will prepare you for more advanced research at the graduate and professional level.
All articles published in PURE Insights will be discoverable in major search engines, such as Google Scholar, making them accessible for anyone and contributing to the global body of knowledge.

The current issue of PURE Insights as well as complete guidelines and a link for submitting your work is available online at: http://digitalcommons.wou.edu/pure

The next online issue will be published May 2015. For questions about PURE Insights or the submission process, please contact Camila Gabaldon (gabaldoc@wou.edu). [/wpspoiler]

Connect Google Scholar to WOU for full text access

Rule #1 of using Google Scholar to do research for your class assignments: never pay for an article. Rule #2 of using Google Scholar to do research for your class assignments: never, ever pay for an article!

In many cases, links to full text scholarly articles (like the kind that Google Scholar finds) are through subscription sources. The library pays for subscriptions to many of these sources already so that you, as a WOU student, can access them for free. But Google Scholar doesn’t know you’re a WOU student, and so it will often ask you to pay for the full text of the article results it provides.

That is, unless you tell Google Scholar you are a WOU student! You do this by changing your “Library links” settings in Google Scholar. Want to see how to change these settings? Watch this short video.

Once you change this setting, Google will recognize you as a WOU student and will show you “Find It @ WOU” links with your results. Get more info & tips for searching Google Scholar here.

Need a midterm break? Check out Films on Demand

Watch online streaming videos about everything from biographies of famous musicians to the history of unions in the U.S. to tips for writing fiction from famous writers (and much more!) for free. Watch the videos in Films on Demand for class or for a study break – there’s something for everyone.

Films On Demand is almost like the library’s version of YouTube, except it’s all legal and appropriate for use in class assignments!

The vast Films on Demand archive currently includes more than 6,100 complete titles and 63,000 shorter video segments. You can browse by subject, such as Health & Medicine, World Languages, Nursing, Criminal Justice & Law, or Archival Films & Newsreels, under the ‘Collections’ menu option. Or you can simply search for videos using keywords.

Happy watching!

Welcome to Primo

What is Primo?

Primo is the new library search tool used to find items in Hamersly Library and our partner Summit libraries, as well as some articles and other electronic resources.

Primo scopes allow you to define where your search is performed. You can select a scope in the drop-down menu right of the search box, or by selecting your desired scope under the search box on the main library home page.[wpspoiler name=”More about Primo” ]

What is included in each scope?

WOU: Books, e-books, audio-visual recordings, maps, scores, microforms, government documents, special collections, journals, magazines, and newspapers available on-site at Hamersly Library.

WOU and Summit: Everything in the WOU list above, plus the holdings of academic libraries in the Pacific Northwest.

WOU, Summit, and Articles, etc.: Everything in the WOU and Summit lists above, as well as some full-text articles. This scope finds search terms in the full-article content.

Primo is one part of your complete search

Primo does not include all the content from the research databases to which WOU subscribes. For discipline-specific searching, use Hamersly Library’s Recommended Databases By Subject.

To search beyond the holdings of Summit libraries, use Worldcat. You can request materials from libraries around the world through Interlibrary Loan (ILL).

Questions or Comments?

We’re happy to hear from you at our Primo feedback form.[/wpspoiler]

Hamersly has books to read for fun, too!

Looking for a good book (or two) to read over summer break? We can help!

The Recreation Collection on the 1st floor of Hamersly has something for every type of reader. *And* we just got a bunch of new books in. We have everything from thrillers to love stories to biographies – and everything in between.

Want a suggestion? Fill out this short form and your WOU librarians will get back to you with some books you might like.