Random Comments for July

3 of the last 4 research consultations that I gave were to high school students in the summer programs here.  They all seemed to be very enthusiastic about learning how to use information resources.  I was concerned that high school students could not understand the technical details in a journal article.  One student was interested in finding thermodynamic properties of fluorinated compounds.  Another was researching high-temperature superconductors.

This summer we made the transition to version 2 of Libguides.  There was somewhat of a learning curve, but there is more flexibility in the new version.

We are also revising the library's website.  There is some redundancy so some pages should be removed.

Before you know it, classes will resume.

Why Do Students Prefer Google Scholar?

It seems that students love Google Scholar.  Let me relate an incident to you about a chemical engineering student who was referred to me by his professor.  I showed the student how to do his search on a topic related to nanotechnology in Scifinder and Scopus.  After this was completed he told me he had already done the search in Google Scholar.  He said that he attended my seminar last fall when I discussed the subscription-based databases.  I looked into my records and saw that just after the seminar he opened a Scifinder account, but apparently never used it.

Go figure!

Congratulations to David McMillan on Receiving His Doctorate in History

I met David McMillan in February 2001 when he worked as a temporary librarian at NJIT for about 3 months.  Since then he has moved on and has worked at a number of public and college libraries.  In 2009 he started to pursue a doctorate of history at Drew University.  After 8 years of hard work he defended his dissertation today and received his Doctor of Letters degree.

Hearty congratulations to Dave and I wish him well in all his professional endeavors.

Bruce Slutsky's Publication List May 2017

Aytac, S., & Slutsky, B. (2017). Authorship Trends of Research Articles Published in Seven Scientific, Technical, Engineering, and Medical (STEM) Library Journals: Analysis of STEM Library Research from 2011–2015. Science & Technology Libraries, 36(2), 114-134

Slutsky, B., & Aytac, S. (2016). Bibliometric Analysis and Comparison of Two STEM LIS Journals: Science & Technology Libraries and Issues in Science & Technology Librarianship (2005–2014). Science & Technology Libraries, 35(2), 152-171. doi:10.1080/0194262X.2016.1171191

Aytac, S., & Slutsky, B. (2015). Research in Academic Reference Librarianship: Review of the 2008–2012 Published Research. The Reference Librarian, 56(3), 205-215. http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1080/02763877.2014.1002730

Aytac, S., & Slutsky, B. (2014). Published Librarian Research, 2008 through 2012: Analyses and Perspectives. Collaborative Librarianship, 6(4), 147-159.

Slutsky, B., & Aytac, S. (2014). Publication Patterns of Science, Technology, and Medical Librarians: Review of the 2008–2012 Published Research. Science and Technology Libraries, 33(4), 369-382. doi:10.1080/0194262X.2014.952486

Osorio, N. L., Slutsky, Bruce. (2012). A Tribute and BioBibliometric Study of Ellis Mount, the First Editor-in-Chief of Science & Technology Libraries. Science and Technology Libraries, 31(4), 394-411. doi: 10.1080/0194262x.2012.730385

Slutsky, B. (1993). Communicating Science to the Public: An Address to Non-Science Librarians. The Reference Librarian(No. 40), 73-87

Slutsky, B. (1991). The American Chemical Society Career Consultants Program. The Indicator, 72(8), 24
.
Slutsky, B. (1991). A Careers in Chemical Information Workshop. Journal of Chemical Education, 68(1), 43-45.

Slutsky, B. (1991). How to Avoid Science Anxiety Among Science Librarians. Science and Technology Libraries, 12(1), 11-19.

Slutsky, B. (1990). Asksam in the New York Public Libary. In M. Fox (Ed.), Exploring Asksam (pp. 43-58). New York: Future Communications Systems.

Slutsky, B. (1990). Informed Career Choices. Chemical and Engineering News, 68(2), 3.

Slutsky, B. (1990). Other Chemical Information Careers. Chapter One, 4(3), 32.

Slutsky, B. (1989). A Chemical Abstracts Training Seminar for Science Librarians. Science and Technology Libraries, 10(1), 55-76.

Lamb, F. A., Cote, Philip N., Slutsky, Bruce, Vitimberga, Bruno M. (1974). Reduction of 9 - (p-methoxyphenyl)-9-fluorenylacetaldhyde on activated alumina. Journal of Organic Chemistry, 39(18). doi: 10.1021/jo00932a026

New Publication

Aytac, S., & Slutsky, B. (2017). Authorship Trends of Research Articles Published in Seven Scientific, Technical, Engineering, and Medical (STEM) Library Journals: Analysis of STEM Library Research from 2011–2015. Science & Technology Libraries, 1-21. doi:10.1080/0194262X.2017.1323070

It has not yet been placed in an issue of this journal

Ann Hoang is Appointed University Librarian at NJIT

Personally, I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate Ann on her appointment to University Librarian at NJIT.  She has been interim University Librarian since the untimely death of Richard Sweeney last May.  She did an excellent job especially since there were several long-term absences of key people over the last year. I was impressed when she attended two of my graduate student seminars in chemical engineering and physics.  I certainly wish her success in her new role.

Below is the announcement made by Provost Fadi Deek:

I am pleased to announce the appointment of Ann D. Hoang to the position of University Librarian, effective July 1, 2017. She has served as interim University Librarian for the past year.

Ms. Hoang has been serving as the Assistant University Librarian at NJIT since December 2006, where her responsibilities have included initiatives related to open source library management systems with other NJ academic libraries and overall library management. Her emphasis has been on library user satisfaction, systems and technology infrastructure, workflow design analysis, and service and process evaluation. Ms. Hoang is a current member of the American Library Association (ALA), Library Information and Technology Association (LITA) and serves on the LibraryLinkNJ Website Advisory Taskforce.  Ms. Hoang is also an active participant in the Virtual Academic Library Environment of NJ and her contributions to the VALID project were recognized when she received the Technology Innovation Award in 2013.

Ms. Hoang has gained administrative experience in positions of increasing responsibility, from Reference and Materials Delivery Coordinator to Library Supervisor at Rutgers University; from Manager of Information Commons and Library Systems to Associate Director at Brookdale Community College; to Assistant University Librarian, and to interim University Librarian at NJIT. In these positions, she has been actively involved in budget management, library technology development, staff hiring and evaluation and forward-thinking concepts related to the future of academic libraries.

Ms. Hoang earned a master’s degree in Business Administration, a master’s degree in Library and Information Science and a bachelor’s degree in Economics, all from Rutgers University.

Please join me in congratulating Ann Hoang as University Librarian.

Thank you,

Librarians and Open Educational Resources (OER)

Certainly, much has been written about Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Access Textbooks (OAT) to be specific.  Textbooks have become more expensive as the price increases exceed the rate of inflation.  Publishers are in business to make money, but I really think they are ripping off students.  What bothers me is the constant updating of textbooks in basic subjects.  For example, the recent 14^th edition of University Physics by Sears and Zemansky costs about $200.  This basic textbook was first published in 1949.  Does basic physics change over a short period of time?  I can understand some revisions, but by issuing newer versions the publishers stifle the used textbook market.

Open Access Textbooks is one way of helping students to save money.  However, it is not a panacea.  Is the quality of OATs as good as that of traditional sources?  At least students would not have to schlep them from home to school J.

What should be the role of librarians in this movement?  They should always disseminate information about printed and electronic resources to those who need them.  Thus faculty in all discipline should be made aware of the OER option.  Librarians never should tell faculty what textbooks to use but should make them aware of all the options.