Meriam Library on the WWW

Scholarships Help Students Reach Goals

Re-User Friendly

Laxson over the Years

A Fire Burns through It

n fall 1997, Chico State's Meriam Library introduced the new Web-based ReSEARCH Station making research more effective and efficient for our students and faculty and placing our campus at the forefront of library technology. The ReSEARCH Station also offers an electronic reference desk where students and faculty can e-mail questions to a reference librarian and get a response within twenty-four hours. Electronic interlibrary loan to order books or articles not owned by the Meriam Library is also available.

Students with home computers connected to the World Wide Web can now access the Library Catalog to determine whether a book is checked out, search for articles in over sixteen periodical indexes, and read journal articles from more than two thousand journals. Once found, information can be printed, downloaded to a disk, or e-mailed. The site is used as a model site by Ameritech (the company that provides our integrated library system) to show other libraries what they can do to customize their Web interface to their library catalog. The ReSEARCH Station provides access to the Online Britannica (the enhanced Web version of the Encyclopedia Brittanica) and other reference materials. Comprehensive links to information from the California and federal governments, including tax, census, and health data, are available and organized for easy access.

"Faculty and students alike benefit from the ReSEARCH Station because it allows them to search a variety of information resources in an easy, familiar, Web-based, point-and-click environment regardless of whether they are in the library, a computer lab, an office, or at home," said Carolyn Dusenbury, director of Library Services.

Because information literacy (the ability to access, evaluate, and use information) is an essential skill for Chico graduates, the library and Student Computing offer drop-in workshops throughout the semester on topics such as finding periodical articles, searching the Web, and using the ReSEARCH Station. A new first-year-student orientation course, Introduction to University Life, focuses on teaching university transition and information literacy skills.

"The ReSEARCH Station will always be a work in progress. New features are being added annually," Dusenbury said. "Soon, students will be able to view their library account. New reference tools are being added. Special historic materials such as photographs are being digitized and are available via the ReSEARCH Station."

In addition to the ReSEARCH Station, the Meriam Library now boasts a new 24-hour access computer lab for students, increased library hours, and workshops on using library resources. The Web page is located at http://www.library. csuchico.edu.

Vicky Banes, Information Resources, and Sarah Blakeslee, Meriam Library