STEM Bridges: Evolution of an Academic Library STEM Outreach Program

Big Orange STEM Saturday (BOSS) is a sustainable model of outreach that fosters the STEM cycle of discovery and learning experiences. Through this program, the library creates and reinforces a bridge between secondary educational experiences and higher education that facilitates the transfer of knowledge from the classroom to the world. Local high school students are able to engage with experts in several different ways to explore what STEM has to offer and to look beyond their current experiences. This approach creates a venue for STEM teaching spaces outside the school classroom for enrichment and innovation. Over the past 5 years, the variety of experiences offered at BOSS have expanded and the reputation of the program has grown. This article explores the challenges, lessons, and impact that this program has had on its constituents, with a particular focus on the impact the library can have when exploring nontraditional areas of support and outreach.     

Emergency Preparedness in the Legal Librarian Community in the United States: Current Culture and the Need to Expand Collaboration

The frequency of natural disasters hitting populated areas is increasing, and due to society’s increased dependency on modern infrastructure, the impacts of disasters have also escalated. I interviewed librarians and law librarians who work or have worked in libraries that were impacted by natural disasters as well as experts in the disaster management field. From their comments and insights, shared in this article, it is clear that there are lessons that can be learned from the larger community in the area of disaster management in law libraries. The law librarian community needs to expand the scope of the national discussion to include disaster management. The key lessons obtained in these national forums, like those shared by the subject matter experts I interviewed, will enable law libraries to become a more resilient and an even more valuable asset to the communities we serve when a natural disaster strikes.     

网络环境下科技期刊的安全建设

【目的】 探索科技期刊在网络环境下应对网络风险的措施,保障科技期刊在编辑、出版、传播等方面的安全性。【方法】 分析当前互联网的安全环境,探讨科技期刊在网络化发展过程中面临的安全隐患。【结果】 从网络化建设的角度提出了建设完善的网络安全制度、多方面配置业务系统安全防护、对涉网人员实施网络安全教育与培训、建立应急预案和灾后重建预案4项综合措施。【结论】 4项综合措施能够提前预防、妥善应对各种网络安全事件,降低科技期刊网络建设面临的风险,提高科技期刊在网络建设过程中的安全性。     

Postgraduate taught students and preparedness for Master’s level study: polishing the facets of the Master’s diamond

Transitions are increasingly recognised as difficult, and less has been written about transitions to postgraduate taught programmes than about transitions into undergraduate or doctoral study. A Scotland-wide project found that new taught Post-graduate (PG), and staff teaching them, can be unclear about what is expected at Master’s level, and proposed a framework of seven facets that indicate how students are expected to engage with Master’s study. The facets and accompanying resources were designed to be discussion tools, to promote staff and student discussion of what is expected in their programme and subject. In a follow-up project at one university, a questionnaire was designed and distributed to postgraduate students asking them to rate their current level of ability against the skills and capabilities identified as facets for Master’s level study. The project found students felt ill-prepared for particular aspects of Master’s level study, with sub-group differences between disciplines. Master’s courses are intensive and fast-moving, so this has implications for students’ preparedness for successfully navigating through their programmes. Some suggestions on how students can be better briefed on what to expect are made.     

What’s inside the suitcases? An investigation into the powerful resources students and lecturers bring to teaching and learning

The study presents a framework for investigating the powerful resources within learners’ educational biographies, which, from their own accounts, appear to influence their engagement with teaching and learning practices. The research framework stresses the material, social and cultural influences on a learner’s biography and the need for recognition as well as the redistribution of resources. It assumes that both socio‐cultural influences as well as individual, affective and agentic phenomena play a role in shaping a student’s career. This framework is discussed in relation to a study undertaken at a South African university, at which 164 students, lecturers and academic support staff participated in semi‐structured interviews. The main focus of the interview was the individual’s educational biography as narrated by the individual. The findings support the socio‐cultural perspective and show that the relationship between identity, identification and feeling ‘at home’ with engagement in deep teaching and learning, is both complex and uneven.     

Public Libraries as Post-Crisis Information Hubs

Like the crisis responses to hurricanes, after a tornadic event public libraries play emergency roles both in the short and long term. Community members rely on public libraries for Internet access to request aid, to help find missing family and friends, to file Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and insurance claims, and, in general, to begin rebuilding their lives. This article reports the quality of services and activities public libraries performed in response and recovery in twelve different communities impacted by tornadoes. The discussion includes an evaluation of the quality of the responses and some recommendations to improve preparedness and response.     

The Monsoon Wedding phenomenon: understanding Indian students studying in Australian universities

How does the University sector identify and support the diverse needs of Indian students? This paper reports on a research project carried out on undergraduate students from India enrolled at a Melbourne‐based University. The focus is the need to understand why Indian students choose an overseas destination for tertiary study. The intent is to explore how the curriculum that they have experienced in their country prepares them for study in another. We examine the expectations of students in relation to studying overseas. The suggestion underlying this paper is that if academic and support staff in tertiary education understand international students in cultural cohorts, then it is more likely that their transition to tertiary education will be easier. We envisage that this may also lead to a greater retention rate for universities.     

Libraries and Natural Disasters

The backdrop for this column was a spate of natural disasters around the world. The column examines the impact of disasters on libraries through multiple lenses: preparedness, recovery, and lessons learned. While the immediate and obvious emphasis may be on facilities and collections, libraries often face additional demands and take on additional roles in aiding their communities, employees, and partner institutions.     

Lessons Learned from Katrina: What Really Matters in a Disaster

SUMMARY

While life's everyday occurrences in libraries leave us with a disaster situation, nothing could have prepared libraries for the magnitude of Hurricane Katrina. Devastating winds, flooding, and destruction to the area infrastructure required a type of response seldom experienced. By revisiting the responses in minor to catastrophic disasters, there are lessons to be learned. Some lessons serve as a source for prevention for potential disaster situations, rehabilitation in localized disasters, and reinvention when libraries are reduced to rubble.