Please be aware that the Library will be moving to a summer hours schedule beginning Tuesday, May 26, 2015. These hours will be in effect through Tuesday, September 8, 2015.

The summer hours of operation are:

Sunday 1 – 7 p.m.
Monday-Thursday 9 a.m. – 7 p.m.
Friday 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Saturday: Closed

If the Ask a Librarian service is closed, please use the question form or voicemail to submit your question, and we will answer it first thing when we get back or use our Ask Us 24/7 chat service which is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Library will be closed May 23 – 25 in observance of Memorial Day.  We will re-open for normal business hours on Tuesday, May 26 at 9am.

If you need assistance, the Ask Us 24/7 Chat Service will be available for the entire weekend. You can ask for help there or you can leave us a message to get back to you on Tuesday.

You may be wondering where to find your textbooks or maybe you just want to know if the library has your textbooks. Did you order e-books online through the bookstore and you now need to know where to find them?

The first place to check for your textbooks is the college bookstore at www.esc.edu/bookstore. They have information on how to find your books, how to order online and their contact information listed there. If you have any questions or need help ordering your books, contact the bookstore directly.

If you ordered e-books for your courses through the college bookstore, you should have received an email with the information about how to access your e-book. You can contact the bookstore if you do not have this email and they can assist you. www.esc.edu/bookstore

You are welcome to check the library e-book catalog to see if we have any of your textbooks in our online library but it is rare that we have textbooks available. You can search the e-book catalog by clicking on Books on the library homepage at www.esc.edu/library. If you do a search and your book is not listed, unfortunately, the online library does not have that book.

You may also have readings located in your course. Often the instructor will list how to access the reading or might include a link to the reading.

When all else fails or you still are not sure what to do, it is always best to check with your instructor.

You can find the link on the library homepage under the heading of Learn.  You can also find it directly at http://subjectguides.esc.edu/researchskillstutorial

The Research Skills Tutorial is like the Information Skills Tutorial but better.  The content has been updated to make sure it is current and appropriate for the needs of our students and faculty in 2015.  It looks much nicer and it is easier to navigate. It is also more focused and interactive.

When you are in the Research Skills Tutorial, you can use the menu on the left side of the screen to find what  you need.  You can choose one section to view information as needed or go through the entire tutorial to sharpen your research skills.  The best part is that you can come back to the tutorial at any time to freshen up on certain things.  Sections include the following:

1. Developing Research Questions – This includes information on how to turn your topic into a research question and information on how to get background information on your topic.
2. Understanding Information Sources – This will take you through the types of information sources, how to tell the difference between scholarly, popular and trade publications, as well as the difference between primary, secondary, and tertiary sources, in addition to other types of sources.
3. Searching for Information Sources – This reviews the difference between using library resources and web resources, how to put your search terms together and combine your terms to get the best results possible, and gives you help with searching online in search engines like Google.
4. Managing Search Results – This goes over how to understand your search results and how to save them for later on in your research.
5. Evaluating Information Sources – This section talks about how to tell if a source is reliable and credible.  Does this source have accuracy, validity, authority?  How do I know these things from looking at a source?  This section will walk you through it.
6. Citing Information Sources – This explains why we need to cite and what a citation is.  You will get a review of the different citation styles and links to citation style guides and tips for doing your citations.

ALL EBSCOhost databases should be available during this time as they are not affected by this maintenance.

The Online Library’s hours for the weekend of April 3- April 5, 2015, Easter weekend, are as follows:

• Friday, April 3 – 9am-2:30pm
• Saturday, April 4 – Closed
• Sunday, April 5 – OPEN 1-9pm

Contact Us:

• askalibrarian.esc.edu
• 800-847-3000, ext. 2222

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There is a widespread problem (it affects more than ESC) with the LinkSource service. This is the service that will take you to full-text in another database if the database that you are in doesn’t have it.

If you find an article and the full-text is not in the database, then here is what to do:

1. Get the article title, journal title, volume, issue, and year.
2. Go to the library web site at http://www.esc.edu/library
3. Click Journals
4. Search for the journal title
5. From the list of databases, select one that has a date range that includes the date of your article, and click it. Log in, if necessary.
6. Search or browse for your article.

EBSCOhost has been notified about this outage, and they are working on it. We will keep you posted!

LinkSource is seen in the library databases, in OneSearch and in Google Scholar when the article is not in that database but you can check the library to see if we have it in another database.  These links will not work during this maintenance time period.

Journal Finder is a link on the library homepage that lets you search ALL of the journals, magazines, newspapers and other periodicals in the library collection.  This is also what is used when you see a listing on the subject guides saying Full Text Journals in a particular subject area.  These links, as shown below, will not be working during the maintenance time period on Saturday.    *Please note that direct links to particular journals will still be working correctly.

The first place to check for your textbooks is the college bookstore at www.esc.edu/bookstore. They have information on how to find your books, how to order online and their contact information listed there. If you have any questions or need help ordering your books, contact the bookstore directly.

If you ordered e-books for your courses through the college bookstore, you should have received an email with the information about how to access your e-book. You can contact the bookstore if you do not have this email and they can assist you. www.esc.edu/bookstore

You are welcome to check the library e-book catalog to see if we have any of your textbooks in our online library but it is rare that we have textbooks available. You can search the e-book catalog by clicking on Books on the library homepage at www.esc.edu/library. If you do a search and your book is not listed, unfortunately, the online library does not have that book.

You may also have readings located in your course. Often the instructor will list how to access the reading or might include a link to the reading.

When all else fails or you still are not sure what to do, it is always best to check with your instructor.

• Friday Feb 13 – 9am-5pm
• Saturday Feb 14 – Closed
• Sunday Feb 15 – 1-9pm
• Monday Feb 16 – Closed

Announcement from MY ESC:

The college, including the Library, IT Service Desk and Student Information Center, is closed Monday, Feb. 16 in observance of President’s Day. The IT Service Desk is open Saturday, Feb. 14 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET. Both the Service Desk and the Library will be open Sunday, Feb. 15 for normal hours of operation (1-9 p.m.),  then reopen on Tuesday, Feb. 17 at 9 a.m. ET. For help with college-supported technology, visit the service desk. To contact a librarian, go to the Library website. For assistance on other matters, please send an email message to the appropriate college office. All college offices will reopen on Tuesday, Feb. 17. The Student Information Center will reopen at 8:30 a.m. E.S.T.; the Library and the IT Service Desk will reopen for normal operations at 9 a.m. ET.