Students – Stauffer Library needs your help. In the spirit of sustainability and environmental consciousness, we have been making an effort to reduce the impact of our services on the natural environment while maintaining a welcoming and comfortable environment in Stauffer Library. We need your help to maintain a Cleaner & Greener Stauffer.

We’re also looking for creative students to design posters to help promote the campaign. There are several prizes to be won, including the grand prize – a new iPod Touch. The deadline for poster submissions is Friday, November 30. Visit the Cleaner & Greener Stauffer Poster Contest page for more details and contest rules.

Patents and Patent Searching for Scientists and Engineers Workshops
will be held in the Douglas Library Electronic Classroom (ground floor) on:

• November 5th, 6:00-7:30pm
• November 8th, 6:00-7:30pm
• November 13th, 12:00-1:30pm

To sign up for a workshop, or for more information, please go to the registration page.

Patents are an increasingly important source of scientific and technical information, much of which is not published in journals. This workshop will demonstrate how you can access the wealth of information in patent literature and provide you with strategies for searching patents in online databases. In this workshop you will learn:

Announced in September of this year, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) will be requiring that all recipients of grants awarded after January 1, 2008 ensure that their original research articles are freely available online within six months of publication.

For more information, go to www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/34916.html.

The Engineering and Science Library will be offering Refworks Workshops on:

• Wednesday, October 31st, 12:30-1:30pm
• Thursday, November 1st,  3:30-4:30pm 
• Tuesday, November 6th, 5:30-6:30pm

In these workshops you learn how to save references from database and library catalogue searches, produce bibliographies, and create personal (or group) databases of citations.

To register please go to the Registration Form. The workshops are designed for those in Engineering and Science but all are welcome to attend.

For more information about Refworks please go to: http://library.queensu.ca/libguides/refworks.htm

Medieval Travel Writing is a new, online collection of digitized manuscript facsimiles of some of the most important works of European travel writing from the 13th to 16th centuries. Included, for example, are the books of Marco Polo, ‘Sir John Mandeville’,  Prester John and early missionaries, as well as a selection of maps and images from illuminated manuscripts.

“The chief focus is on journeys to central Asia and the Far East, including accounts of travel to Mongolia, Persia, India, China and South-East Asia. The collection also includes a number of important accounts of travels to or through the Holy Land although in this it makes no claims to full or even broad coverage: a separate collection, covering crusading and pilgrimage narratives, would be required for that. It features a number of medieval maps such as the famous ‘Beatus’ and ‘Psalter’ maps, individual manuscript illuminations, and some modern translations of key travel texts.”  – Editorial Introduction by Dr Kim Phillips, http://www.medievaltravel.amdigital.co.uk/Introduction/Index.aspx

Read more information about this new Library acquisition.

Health Sciences Teachers: Please join us on Thursday November 1st for the e-teaching Lunchtime Series session, Finding Images, Videos and More: Technology For Your Teaching. The session is from 12:30 – 1:30 in Bracken 127 with an optional hands-on session afterwards. Please bring your own lunch to enjoy while you learn how to locate and use multimedia.The series is put on by the e-teaching collaborative (etc), a joint venture from within the Faculty of Health Sciences whose aim is to provide one-stop access to expertise in electronic learning resources, technological tools and educational methodology. Please visit http://meds.queensu.ca/eteaching to find out more.

The 2007 Globe & Mail Report Card has arrived. Over 43,000 undergraduate students across Canada responded to more than 100 questions about their university experience ranging from the quality of teaching to their opinion of libraries. It is gratifying to note that out of 53 universities, Queen’s Library was one of only 3 libraries to receive an A rating for overall quality, ranking first in our category of medium-sized universities. You also gave us top marks for services provided by library staff, study space, online resources, availability of journals, and an A+ for hours of operation. Thank you!

While your support is greatly appreciated, we also recognise that the Library needs to do more to better support the needs of the broader Queen’s community. We are committed to increasing accessibility to information sources required by graduate students and faculty, and to maintaining the Library’s exceptional service standards. To find out more about how we are working to improve Library resources and services, please visit http://library.queensu.ca/webir/libqual-2007/results-2007.html

In celebration of Islamic History Month Canada, the Engineering and Science Library has set up a science-related book display on the first floor (one floor above entry).

To mark this month, the Kingston Committee for Islamic History Month and the Islamic Society of Kingston, are organizing several events

On October 26th, 7:00 pm Dr. Seyyid Hossein Nasr, Professor Emeritus of George Washington University will speak on “The Interconnections of Islamic Art, Science and Spirituality” in Chernoff Hall Auditorium.

Other events and contact information are listed here .

Annual Botterell Closure for Ventilation Shutdown and Maintenance:

Bracken Library will be closed from 9:00 PM Friday, October 19, until 8:00 AM Monday, October 22.

Botterell Hall will be closed from October 20th at 7:00 AM until 6:00 PM October 21st: During this time, only personnel who are doing critical research will be allowed in the building.

Also, from October 22nd until October 26th, building ventilation will be reduced to 75%.

If you have any concerns, please contact Kevin P. McKegney, Building Manager for Botterell Hall, x74476 or kevin.mckegney@queensu.ca.

Issac Larios (Electrical Engineering) correctly identified Queen’s University Library as the place where you can get assistance in uncovering additional scholarly information sources that can help you to excel in university. Congratulations, Isaac, on winning the iPod Shuffle draw for undergraduates!

Roslyn Dakin (Biology) correctly identified all of the following services provided by Librarians: research consultations to help identify useful information resources; advice or support in developing undergraduate course assignments that make the most of library resources and promote inquiry-based learning; regular office hours offered in academic departments; advice or support in subscribing to alert services (e.g., RSS feeds) to help stay current in any field of teaching or research. Congratulations, Roslyn, on winning the iPod Shuffle draw for graduate and professional students!