July 2008 Archives
Beginning July 31, 2008, two of James Branch Cabell Library's first floor group study rooms will be closed temporarily for renovation. VCU Libraries is adding technology resources to Rooms 144 and 145 to promote collaborative work. When the renovations are completed, each of the study rooms will house a PC computer workstation with a large, wall-mounted screen. These computing resources are already available in four other first floor group study rooms.
For those seeking alternative group study spaces, additional group study rooms are available on the third floor. The Linden Group Study Zone on the second floor is also available for group work.
VCU Libraries regrets any inconvenience and appreciates your patience as we continue to improve the collaborative work spaces.
VCU Libraries is pleased to announce the latest addition to the VCU Libraries Digital Collections. In March 2008, an online collection of over a hundred issues of PS Magazine, the U.S. Army preventive maintenance publication illustrated and edited by cartoonist Will Eisner from 1951 to 1972, was released. Now, thanks to the loan of 92 issues for scanning from the Army, VCU Libraries is offering online the complete run of all Will Eisner-produced issues of the magazine: issue numbers 1 through 229, plus 3 special issues and 22 index issues. The Army's donation increased the online collection by over half.
To view this or any digital collection, visit dig.library.vcu.edu.
Starting the week of July 21, the preferred way of accessing RefWorks will be via any of the RefWorks links on VCU Libraries Web pages. These links all have the EZProxy authentication address embedded and will prompt for eID and password. Users may bookmark http://proxy.library.vcu.edu/login?url=http://www.refworks.com/refworks for easy access.
The Group Code that many users have been using for remote access and for Write-N-Cite will be changed next week. The new Group Code will be visible to VCU users who first login using their eID/password combination. The link to the Group Code will be located on the VCU Libraries RefWorks home page.
RefWorks account holders who are no longer affiliated with VCU may obtain the Group Code by submitting a Logon Problem Report. The Group Code will be sent via email along with instructions for saving the references and a deadline for making this change. RefWorks accounts not associated with the new Group Code will be deleted as soon as the deadline has passed.
Funds are expected from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support added supplements for the 2010 General Social Survey (GSS). Proposals for topics for these NSF-funded modules are solicited from the social science community. The submission deadline is October 1, 2008. Please note that there may be space for non-NSF funded modules as well. For questions about this opportunity please contact Tom W. Smith, GSS Director at the National Opinion Research Center (NORC), at smitht@norc.uchicago.edu.
This announcement was received by VCU's Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) Official Representative, Jennifer Darragh. For more information about ICPSR, please contact Jennifer at jdarragh@vcu.edu.
The American Psychological Association recently announced that it would charge authors $2,500 for depositing articles into PubMed Central. The Association has apparently decided to rethink the new policy; according to APA's website the policy is "currently being re-examined and will not be implemented at this time."
The Chronicle of Higher Education reported the policy on July 15, 2008, and its blog quickly filled with comments. According to The Chronicle, authors publishing in APA journals were told not to deposit the articles themselves and that the fee would be billed to the author's university.
Authors who receive funding from the National Institutes of Health are now required to submit articles arising from the funded research into PubMed Central, the National Library of Medicine's digital archive. For more information, visit the VCU Libraries' page on Navigating the New NIH Mandatory Public Access Policy.
The American Psychological Association recently announced that it would charge authors $2500 for depositing articles into PubMed Central. But the Association has apparently decided to rethink the new policy. According to APA's website, the policy is "currently being re-examined and will not be implemented at this time."
The Chronicle of Higher Education reported the policy on July 15, 2008 and its blog quickly filled with comments. According to The Chronicle , authors publishing in APA journals were told not to deposit the articles themselves and that the fee would be billed to the author's university.
Authors who receive funding from the National Institutes of Health are now required to submit articles arising from the funded research into PubMed Central, the National Library of Medicine's digital archive. For more information, visit the VCU Libraries' page on Navigating the New NIH Mandatory Public Access Policy.
Just Published: Open Access: Opportunities and Challenges--a Handbook
A Joint publication of the European Commission and the German Commission for UNESCO, 2008
The English version of the handbook, a joint publication with the European Commission's Science in Society Programme, has just been published. The publication is available in print and electronic versions. The handbook aims to provide information about the opportunities and challenges offered by Open Access, and to present a wide array of issues and positions under debate. The English version of the handbook is a translation of the handbook in German, published by the German Commission for UNESCO in 2007.
Download the book here or here.
More details about the book: http://www.unesco.de/openaccess-en.html
[source: Diglib announcement from Anup Kumar Das, 2008-07-09]
VCU Libraries and VCUarts are pleased to announce that the Visual Resource Center (VRC) will be moving to James Branch Cabell Library, opening on Monday, July 28. The VRC's collection of some 700,000 slides, LUNA database of digitized images, and staff will become part of VCU Libraries and will continue its service to VCUarts, along with providing service to the university at large.
A task force of library and VCUarts representatives was established in April to study the feasibility of the move and to recommend an appropriate location and service model for the VRC within VCU Libraries. The relocation is expected to result in improved space for the VRC, with the benefit of better security and access. The new organizational structure will incorporate the expertise of the VRC Director of Collections and his understanding of VCUarts practices and operations to ensure that the needs of VCUarts continue to be met. In addition, the experience of the VCU Libraries in both physical and digital preservation will ensure that the collections are well cared for and transitioned to the digital environment.
The VRC will be located in Room 301C of Cabell Library, at the back of the Media and Reserves Department on the third floor. The VRC will close July 16 to prepare the collection and staff for the move, and will reopen July 28 in time to assist VCUarts faculty preparing for fall semester courses.
For questions regarding the move, please contact Pat Flanagan, Associate University Librarian for Public Services, VCU Libraries, or Vaughn Garland, VRC Director of Collections.
July 1, 2008 is the 40th anniversary of the creation of Virginia Commonwealth University. VCU resulted from several studies dating from the early and mid-1960s which expressed the need felt by many for Virginia to have a major urban university in Richmond. The most important of those reports was issued in 1967 by the Wayne Commission which developed an implementation plan head by Edward A. Wayne Sr. (1903-1990), president of the Richmond Federal Reserve Bank.
The recommendation, supported by the Governor and General Assembly, was the creation of VCU. Wayne's vision for the school rejected a merger and proposed instead to create a completely new entity with Richmond Professional Institute and the Medical College of Virginia as its components. The Commission's report stated that "an urban-oriented university is unique in that its basic philosophy concentrates on meeting the needs of an urban population living and working in an urban environment. The city is truly its living laboratory."
Wayne was named vice-rector of the first Board of Visitors of VCU and the University's Wayne Medal honors individuals who have made outstanding contributions or provided exemplary service to VCU.
The Wayne Commission Report is available online as part of VCU Libraries' Digital Collections.
Academic Search Complete is VCU Libraries' new multidisciplinary full-text database replacing Academic OneFile. Academic Search Complete, published by EBSCO, contains more than 5,990 full-text periodicals, including more than 5,030 peer-reviewed journals. In addition to full-text, Academic Search Complete offers indexing and abstracting for more than 9,990 journals and a total of more than 10,400 publications, including monographs, reports, and conference proceedings. Subjects covered include anthropology, biology, chemistry, electrical engineering, ethnic and multicultural studies, geography, geology, law, mathematics, mechanical engineering, music, physics, psychology, religion and theology, science, sociology, women’s studies, and many other fields. Updated daily, with content going as far back as 1887, Academic Search Complete is made available to VCU by the Virtual Library of Virginia.
Access Academic Search Complete from the VCU Libraries A-Z list of databases or by choosing Academic Search Complete from the Quick Links menu on the VCU Libraries homepage.
