Undergraduates, win money for your research project!

The University Libraries Undergraduate Research Award is now open for nominations!

If you are currently enrolled at UNCG, then one of your UNCG course assignments from 2012 could win you $500!

The awards committee is seeking papers and other projects that involved significant use of library collections.  You don't need to have performed an experiment, but you will be asked to write an essay about your library research strategies (which library sources were used for your project).

The application deadline is March 1. 

The application, details about the essay, and other details are on this page: http://library.uncg.edu/info/undergraduate_research_award.aspx

Good luck!

Webinar Weds 1/6-Information for International Development: Poverty Reduction, International Organizations, and Civil Society

The webinar series Help! I'm an Accidental Government Information Librarian continues this Wednesday 1/16 from 1-2 pm EST

These talks are always very good. No comment on my own contribution, which I enjoyed preparing but ended up giving during a brief break between back-to-back budget cut meetings. Serenity Now!!

Anyhoo, I'm looking forward to this next session: 

Information for International Development: Poverty Reduction, International Organizations, and Civil Society.  January 16 from 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. (Eastern).
This session will cover International Government Organization (IGO) and civil society information sources in the areas of economic growth, development assistance, poverty interventions, microfinance, capacity building, inequality, remittances, and foreign aid.  We will examine documentation and statistics from International Development Organizations, such as the World Bank & Regional Development Banks, the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations Development Programme, the World Institute for Development Economics Research, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the United Nations Human Settlements Programme, the OECD, and the United Nations Regional Commissions.  Sources of international development data will be explored at length, as well as development aid documentation from the World Bank and other international financial institutions. In contrast to, and as a potential challenge to the leading IGO paradigms, we will also explore development strategies and information sources from civil society organizations (NGOs) with an emphasis on those in the Global South, including the Grameen Bank, Brac, ASA, and others.
Presenter Jim Church, is the librarian for economics and international & foreign government information at the University of California Berkeley.  He is active in the ALA Government Documents Roundtable where he served as the international documents columnist for the journal DttP for four years, and currently serves as the Secretary of the IFLA Government Information and Official Publications Section. His primary areas of interest include international poverty and development issues, statistics, human rights, NGOs, and digital archiving.
We will meet together for Session #22, online on Wednesday, January 16 from 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. (Eastern). Please RSVP for the Session by January 15 at 5:00 pm using this link:  http://tinyurl.com/grs-session22
The session will be recorded and made available after the live session, linked from the NCLA GRS web page (http://www.nclaonline.org/government-resources).

Webinar Tues 1/15, Changes to NIH Public Access Policy and Implications

 The National Institutes of Health  are tightening up the NIH Public Access Policy.

"In Spring, 2013, at the earliest, NIH will delay processing of non-competing continuation grant awards if publications arising from that award are not in compliance with the NIH public access policy. The award will not be processed until recipients have demonstrated compliance. This change will take effect in tandem with NIH requiring the use of the Research Performance Progress Report (RPPRs) for all Streamlined Non-competing Award Process (SNAP) and Fellowship awards in the Spring of 2013..."

A webinar on Tuesday 1/15/2012, 12:30-2 pm EST, is meant to introduce Compliance Officials at grantee institutions to the changes.  But authors and investigators are welcome to attend.  Space is limited, registration is required.

MONEY - Undergraduate research awards

Not library news, but very good news that I've been asked to share...

The Office of Undergraduate Research is proud to offer the following
funding opportunities to encourage involvement of UNCG undergraduate
students in research and creative activities and to support the
faculty who actively work with the students.

OUR Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity Award
It provides up to $3000 award to a student. Deadline January 25, 2013.
Formerly known as URA but application and review process is now a bit
different.
See http://our.uncg.edu/funding/URCA.php for details.


OUR Faculty Minigrants
A pilot program that provides a small amount of funding (up to $2000)
to faculty to work on a research project with undergraduate
student(s). Deadline January 25, 2013.
See http://our.uncg.edu/funding/faculty_minigrants.php for details.


OUR Research Courses Minigrants
A pilot program that provides a small amount of funding (up to $2000)
to the teachers of research intensive courses to enhance the students’
experience. Deadline January 25, 2013.
See http://our.uncg.edu/funding/research_courses_minigrants.php for details.


OUR Travel Fund
A revised program that provides support (up to $500) for UNCG
undergraduate students to present results of their research at
conference. Deadline is rolling. See
http://our.uncg.edu/funding/travel.php for details.

PubMed-based search tools for biomedical research

"PubMed Derivatives," a nice overview of free online search engines based on PubMed. From Lu's 2011 article 

PubMed and beyond: a survey of web tools for searching biomedical literature. Database : the Journal of Biological Databases and Curation

Medical librarian essay - Lactivate your library!

Essays for the NN/LM SeA "Share Your Success" essay contest have been posted!

Directions were to "write about your success in a non-traditional librarian role OR about success in demonstrating library value."

Check out my essay here:

Share Your Success: Lactivate your library! Experiences and outcomes of a non-traditional service

Library workshops - Pinterest, Ebook Basics

Check the the calendar and register for upcoming University Libraries workshops!

Coming up in November:

Pinterest in 30 minutes - Tues 11/6/2012, noon-1 pm, online

Pinterest, one of the newer social media tools, has been gaining in popularity and can be used as a powerful tool in visual learning. It allows you to create visual book, movie and resource lists that can engage students more fully then simple words. This workshop will give you the basics for using pinterst as a planning and teaching tool.

Ebook basics at UNCG - Thurs 11/15/2012, noon-1 pm, online

Join this online session to learn basics of ebooks available at UNCG. This session will show you our guide and demo how to find the hundreds of thousands of e-books at the University Libraries and give you tips on their use.