How can the Library help you this summer?

Summer term will soon be here and the Gardner-Harvey Library would like to send some reminders about our summer services. The library is open year round to help with library instruction and embedded librarianship, offer a variety of technical equipment, including laptops and iPads, and provide study rooms for quiet study or group work. 

For more information about our services, please check out our Faculty Guide or our Library Services page.

Curious what an embedded librarian can do for your summer course? Having an embedded librarian in your Canvas course sites is a great way to strengthen students’ academic research skills and information literacy.

Looking back over past semesters, did your students struggle with … ?

• Incorporating scholarly sources in their research projects
• Evaluating online sources for currency, relevance, accuracy, authority, & purpose
• Requesting items from other Miami libraries and OhioLINK
• Citing sources correctly in APA or MLA style
• Using information ethically (i.e. academic integrity)

Regional campus librarians can help students master these skills through custom research guides embedded in your Canvas course site. Contact us to discuss your goals and we will tailor the guide to match them.

If you already collaborate with an embedded librarian, please let us know that you want to continue the service this summer. We will review your guide to ensure that links are functional and content is up-to-date before classes start.

If you are ready to try a new approach this summer, please contact 

Beth Tumbleson, Middletown, 513-727-3232,  tumbleb@miamioh.edu

Mark Shores, Hamilton, 513-785-3203,   shoresml@miamioh.edu 

#MoveInMiami - Help students succeed by supporting the Library

#MoveInMiami -- a one-day fundraiser for Miami University -- is today, Thursday, August 25! It supports activities throughout the University, and the library has been added to the list of possible funds to receive donations. 

As an added bonus to regional campus donors and friends, our retired Regional Dean Mike Pratt and his wife Patty will personally contribute $10 to the fund of your choice for each new gift raised on 8/25 (a gift must be $5 or more and must be given to a regional campus fund).  And if this day of giving reaches our 400 donor goal, our interim Regional Dean Cathy Bishop-Clark and her husband Greg will give $1,000 to the regional campus fund that has the most donors.

This is an exciting opportunity for the library to raise gift funds to support our programming, add new books and technology, and provide services to students, faculty and staff members, and members of the Middletown community.  We hope to increase the number of textbooks we let students borrow and the number of laptops and iPads we are able to check out to students.  Another big push for us this year is buying supplies for 3D printing and other creative activities as we teach students to innovate in our TEC Lab makerspace.

If you are interested in making even a small gift to the Gardner-Harvey Library (or our sister library in Hamilton), please use the form at http://www.forloveandhonor.org/regionallibraries. All gifts are tax deductible, and you will be emailed a receipt upon making a gift online. Gifts must be made on August 25 to qualify for this initiative.

Thank you very much for your time!

John

John J. Burke, MSLS
Library Director & Principal Librarian
Gardner-Harvey Library
Miami University Middletown

burkejj@miamioh.edu
513-727-3293
http://miamioh.edu/burkejj

Help Students Succeed: Support the Gardner-Harvey Library!

#MoveInMiami -- a one-day fundraiser for Miami University -- is on Thursday, August 20. It supports activities throughout the University, and the library has been added to the list of possible funds to receive donations. 

As an added bonus to regional campus donors and friends, Regional Campus Dean Mike Pratt and his wife Patty will personally contribute $10 to the fund of your choice for each new gift raised by 8/20 (a gift must be $5 or more and must be given to a regional campus fund).

This is an exciting opportunity for the library to raise gift funds to support our programming, add new books and technology, and provide services to students, faculty and staff members, and members of the Middletown community.  We hope to increase the number of textbooks and the number of laptops we are able to check out to students, and, as a stretch goal, to add a laser cutter to our TEC Lab makerspace.

If you are interested in making even a small gift to the Gardner-Harvey Library (or our sister library in Hamilton), please use the form at http://www.forloveandhonor.org/RegionalLibraries. All gifts are tax deductible, and you will be emailed a receipt upon making a gift online. Gifts must be made between now and August 20 to qualify for this initiative.

Thank you very much for your time!

John

John J. Burke, MSLS
Library Director & Principal Librarian
Gardner-Harvey Library
Miami University Middletown

burkejj@miamioh.edu
513-727-3293
http://miamioh.edu/burkejj

Resource of the Week: Laptops

Looking for a computer with Microsoft Office to finish your paper or presentation? The Library has them. In addition to our public access computers, the Library also has 15 laptops and netbooks with wireless network cards available for students to check out. These items check out through closing time on the following day (one-day loan). A set of laptops and tablet PCs are also available for checkout to faculty and staff.

Netbooks are here!

The Library has added seven Acer Aspire One netbooks to our one-day loan laptops on reserve. The netbooks are small and lightweight (with 8.9" screens, weighing just over 2 pounds), yet powerful and capable of your web-browsing and document-creating needs (a fairly large keyboard, 6 hours of battery time, and includes the full Microsoft Office application suite).

Check one out today to enjoy easy, go-anywhere access to coursework. Netbooks, like our other laptops, check out through the time the library closes on the next day we are open. Check out a netbook on Tuesday at 10:30am, and it's due back on Wednesday at 7:00pm (our summer hours) or 9:00pm (when school starts back in August).

The Library now has 12 laptops available for students and 8 laptops for faculty and staff to check out.

In the lap(top) of luxury

Well, that might be overstating things a bit, but we are very happy to let you know the array of laptops that are available to Miami Middletown students, faculty, and staff thanks to a partnership between Technology Services and the library. With our combined financial support, we can now offer the following equipment for use:

For students:

• 4 laptops are available for three-hour loan
• 3 laptops are available for one-day loan

For faculty and staff members:

• 5 laptops are available for seven-day loan
• 2 tablet PCs are available for seven-day loan

We hope that these machines will assist students who would like to use a laptop anywhere on campus (given our campus-wide wireless network) or who need to take a laptop home for overnight use. Faculty and staff who need to travel and present or who need a laptop for use on campus can also benefit.

Checking out a laptop requires your Miami University ID and the one-time completion of a laptop loan form. Please let us know how we can assist you with these devices.

Let me also add that the library, thanks to Technology Services, also has on library reserve the manuals for Microsoft Outlook 2007 and Entourage for Mac OS X 2004 (five copies of each, available to students, faculty, and staff).