Bird's Eye View Feb/March 2024

Bird's Eye View

February/March 2024

Library Research Skill Workshops

The library is offering 32 Zoom workshops on 8 different topics this semester. Students must pre-register for a workshop in order to attend. To do so, they can click on the “Workshops & Tutorials” link in the “Research” section of the Library website (also found via the QR code at the bottom of this page).

Registration is available one week before the workshop. Students will receive a reminder email 2 hours before the workshop begins with the Zoom link. All workshops are taught over Zoom.

This semester, workshops will be offered during week 5 (February 12-15), week 7 (February 26-March 1), week 13 (April 15-19), and week 14 (April 22-26).

If you assign workshops to your students for extra credit, you will receive an email with a list of your students’ names 1-2 weeks following the workshop they attended.

Workshop Topics

We have changed some of our workshop offerings this semester! The updated list is below.

• Avoiding Plagiarism
• Evaluating Articles
• Evaluating News Sources
• Finding Articles in Periodical Databases
• Finding Books & eBooks
• Introduction to Evaluating Sources
• Introduction to Research Sources
• Research Strategies

Ready Reference: Research Wizard

BC students have access to 99 databases through the BC Library. While we librarians are thrilled to offer so much, the reality is that such a large amount of choice can feel overwhelming to our students. Many students we provide reference services to have only used OneSearch (if they are aware of our databases at all)--a great resource particularly for finding books, but once again potentially overwhelming due to the sheer amount of results returned from a basic search. How can we reach students who aren’t already reaching out to us and help them feel more confident that they are looking in the right place for the right source types in their research?

Enter the Research Wizard, an interactive branching quiz designed to lead students to a database relevant to their specific needs! Librarian Ariel Dyer, as a result of her fascination with immersive storytelling and theatre, created the Wizard using an open-sourced storytelling software called Twine that allows for players to take different paths depending on the answers they give and what they choose to click on. The Wizard serves as a tool to connect students to databases where appropriate, or to more tailored librarian assistance if needed.

What type of source are you looking for?

• Scholarly source like books and peer reviewed journal articles
• Popular sources like newspaper and magazine articles, and biographical information
• Statistics
• Primary sources (for history courses)
• Not sure!
• I'm looking for multiple source types

Approach the Wizard yourself (and encourage your students to) by heading to the library homepage, clicking the “Research” button, then the highlighted text “ResearchWizard” right below the heading. This is just one of many ways your BC librarians continue to engage and connect with your students. Let us know what you think!

Introducing Megan Davis

The Panorama campus library is very happy to welcome new adjunct librarian Megan Davis to campus this semester!

Megan Davis is a native to SoCal and obtained her Bachelor's degree in sociology from UCLA before receiving her Master's in Library & Information Science from San Jose State University. She also teaches Information and Media Literacy for the Incarcerated Students Education Program at the California Correctional Institution. When her head is not in a book she enjoys thrifting and playing board games with friends.

Ezproxy Update

Over the semester break, the Library made a slight modification to the way students and staff off-campus access subscription research databases.  This change required we modify all of the database links on the Library’s website and A-Z Database List.  But if you have links to library databases in any of your Canvas modules you may need to manually update the URLs.

The easiest way to do this is visit the Library’s A-Z Databases List and copy the URLs you find there, since they’ve been updated. Another approach is to just change the first portion of the URLs from the old one (https://ezproxy.bakersfieldcollege.edu/)  to the new (https://login.bakersfieldcollege.idm.oclc.org/)

If you encounter problems or need help, don’t hesitate to contact Kirk Russell in the Library at krussell@bakersfieldcollege.edu or (661) 395-4625.

Read All About It! New Books At The Library

The following is a curated list of the new and exciting titles in the library's print collection. Students and faculty may check out any of these titles.

Titles are arranged in order of call number. The default location for these titles is the Panorama (main) campus library. If the title is available at Delano and/or BCSW, that location will be added to the end of the call number.