It’s Easy to Be Green

Make simple changes in your life to reduce your carbon footprint and be more environmentally friendly for Earth Day and beyond. Search our websites and databases under the Environment heading for more resources on how you can make a difference!

City of St. Louis Book Reuse and Recycling Links – Contains links for St. Louis organizations that accept materials for reuse or recycling, tips about recycling, and more.

e-Cycle – St. Louis – Donate your old PC or laptop to a worthy cause. E-Cycle refurbishes computers, which are then given to local schools or businesses.

Ecological Footprint Quiz – Take a quiz to find out how much of a carbon footprint you leave to maintain your lifestyle. 

Freecycle – Give your items a second life on Freecycle, where they can find a new home. 

Leftovers, etc. - Provides surplus resources donated by business, industry and the local communities committed to the development and advancement of education and the arts. 

Operation Brightside – Help to make your community a beautiful place through cleaning and greening initiatives. 

The Greens – Kids learn about sustainability and green living. 

Ridefinders – This St. Louis based organization will help you find share a ride to work, reducing emissions and saving you money at the same time! 

---Anna H., Jamestown Bluffs Branch

Issue with Gale Databases [Resolved]

Notification from Gale:

Gale, Cengage Learning is currently experiencing server related issues which is affecting the Gale, Cengage Learning resources. Our engineers are diligently working to resolve the issues and to get the resources back to normal working order as soon as possible. 

Term Paper Help - Part II: Academic Search Elite

In a previous post, we discussed St. Louis County Library's database Academic OneFile and its wealth of academic and news articles, video and audio for research tasks. With Academic OneFile so useful, is there a need for a second academic database, such as Academic Search Elite?

The answer is yes! Assume as before that someone is researching nuclear accidents.  They will start at www.slcl.org, select the Research tab, then databases A-Z on the left hand side and choose Academic Search Elite, the second database under the letter A.  Within this database, after logging in with library card number and PIN, a customer can enter "nuclear accidents" as the subject.  The results can be further limited to full text.

As with Academic OneFile, professional journals such as Nuclear Engineering result.  However, a significant difference is that now there are results from the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Journal of Environmental Radioactivity.  In addition, Academic Search Elite has an "images" link at the top, which the researcher can use to find photos, charts and diagrams to include in their work.

Taken together, these two databases at the top of the list are a powerful, complementary team for most serious research.

--Harry C., Reference

Benvenuto to Reference USA

I recently moved to the epicenter of all things Italian in St. Louis, The Hill, and my diet’s gone south. Who can blame me with Zia’s, Modesto’s, Milo’s, Vitali’s, Missouri Bakery, Amighetti’s, Guido’s, and Gioia’s Deli steps from my door?  I shop at DiGregorio’s, Viviano’s, Herbaria, and Girasole on a regular basis. Eating and buying local is important to the fabric of my community. A business owner found out I was a librarian, and she began picking my brain for ways the Italian-American Chamber of Commerce Mid-America could reach out to other Italian business owners in the area. Luckily Reference USA was able to help us out!

ReferenceUSA contains detailed profiles of over 14 million businesses throughout the United States that make finding a specific search, such as Italian business owners for the St. Louis Metro area, possible. We discovered over 4500 contacts she can use to help other Italian businesses do business with one another and Italy. This means more quality goods at prices that regular people can afford. It keeps people in business, supports the local economy, and nourishes a thriving community.Check out Reference USA, other business databases, and the Mind Your Business lecture series at the St. Louis County Library!

 --Anna H., Jamestown Bluffs

Associations Unlimited

What is networking? We hear it a lot nowadays and know it is important. Merriam-Webster defines it as “the exchange of information or services among individuals, groups, or institutions; specifically : the cultivation of productive relationships for employment or business.”

How do you network?  A great way to network in your field, potential field or to find people that have similar interests as you, is through associations. 

How do you find these associations? We have a great database: Associations Unlimited by Gale. It has been a premier source for information on associations and professional societies for 50 years.  Go to www.slcl.org> Research >Quick Reference> Associations Unlimited.

You can do an association name or acronym search, location search, subject/word search, along with custom and expert searching. You can view your searches online or export mailing lists. The entries give description, contact information and links to the association.  

If you have additional questions, call Reference at 314-994-3300 ext 2050.

--Tiffany D., Reference

Term Paper Help - Part I

Many students come to us for term paper help.  The St. Louis County Library has amazing databases that greatly simplify research tasks.  For example, Academic OneFile provides academic and news articles, news video from NBC News, and audio recordings from NPR (including transcripts).

For example, assume that someone is researching nuclear accidents.  They will start at www.slcl.org, then select the Research tab, then databases A-Z on the left hand side and choose Academic OneFile, the first database under the letter A.  Within this database, after logging in with library card number and name, a customer can enter "nuclear accidents" as the subject.  The results can further limited to full text.

The results?  145 academic articles, 156 magazine articles, 48 videos and 73 audio clips.  The results feature magazines such as The Economist, Earth Island Journal, and The Science Teacher.  Best of all, the reader can click on "citation tools" in the top right corner and select APA 6th Ed. or MLA 7th Ed as the citation format.  This makes it very easy to cite the article in a term paper.

--Harry C., Reference

About the Author

Did you ever need to find information about a certain author but have no idea where to look? Start with the Literature Resource Center, which contains material on over 120,000 authors, including biographies, bibliographies, critical essays, interviews, book reviews, journal articles and much more.

To get started, first go to Research from the library’s homepage.  Then, choose Literature and scroll down to find the Literature Resource Center.  There are several search options such as the author’s name, keyword or even title. The results of a search are broken down by content area, which is handy if you are specifically looking for a biography, book review or a primary source.  

When I need a comparison of the works of Emily and Charlotte Brontë from an academic journal or just a listing of titles by Stephen King (including those written under a pseudonym), Literature Resource Center is my starting point.

--Stacey L., Reference