Time to sing the praises not only of libraries but of librarians — because a library is not only an architectural structure, a physical location, or simply a collection of books and other written and audiovisual materials. While I have ample appreciation of the physical space of the library, which can be a pleasant oasis or a life-saving refuge, and the books and other materials that are contained therein, I also want to give a shout out to librarians. I am proud to count several librarians and archivists (not quite the same, but close relatives to librarians, in terms of training, breadth of knowledge, and passion for the written word) among my dear friends (although at least one is no longer working the field). For academics and researchers — especially ones like myself who are temporarily away from home — library staff (at both my own university library and other institutions) are true lifesavers. I am still in awe of interlibrary loan, and view it as a minor miracle, especially for articles: even though my university library does not subscribe to all the journals and databases I need, nor does it have all the books I’d like. But I’ve rarely requested an article or book that interlibrary loan has not SOMEHOW managed to find for me. The library staff has also been generous enough to scan some book chapters for me, as I am a few thousand miles away in a different country and not easily able to march over and sign out books.

While I am especially appreciative of my university librarians, I also have found that even in somewhat remote branches of the public libraries, a conversation with the library staff is usually productive and rewarding. If there isn’t already a “librarian’s appreciation day”, there oughta be!

Dr. Sharon Weiner, Dean of Library Services at the UMassD Claire T. Carney Library, co-chaired the third annual Peabody Academic Library Leadership Institute at Vanderbilt University from July 6-10, 2008.  Twenty-five Institute Fellows represented colleges and universities in 17 states.  Several from under-represented groups and minority-serving institutions were awarded Laura Bush Scholarships from the Institute of Museum and Library Services to attend.  The Institute speakers were nationally-recognized figures in higher education leadership.  They focused on understanding the higher education environment so that library leaders can position their libraries to support institutional missions.

To All Faculty,

Library Services, Information Resources and Technology(LSIRT)is pleased
to announce Turnitin, a plagiarism detection service, is now available
to all UMass Dartmouth faculty.

Turnitin evaluates the originality of students’ work by comparing their
electronic documents to online sources and the Turnitin databases.
Turnitin searches for textual matches from current copy and archived
copies of publicly accessible Internet pages, subscription databases,
and a UMass Dartmouth database of previously submitted work. Once a
paper has been submitted to the database, an originality report is
generated that highlights text matches to other documents. Faculty will
then need to review and evaluate the report to determine if plagiarism
is present.

Click here to get started using Turnitin,
https://www.lib.umassd.edu/get/turnitin/turnitin_services.html

Look for Turnitin drop-in training/question and answer sessions to be
announced in September.

Library Services, Information Resources and Technology

Further information about Turnitin:
https://turnitin.com/static/index.html

Additional questions should be directed to:
Instructional Development
idteam@umassd.edu
508 999-8501
or
Library Reference Department
https://www.lib.umassd.edu/libraryinfo/contact.cfm?subdept=4
(508) 999-8678