Through borrowing agreements with other libraries, you could get an article emailed directly to you within a couple of days.  Books or media may take up to a week or longer.  But they will be delivered to your home library (Ozark Campus or Russellville Campus) for convenient pick-up. If you are a distance education student, we can even mail them to your home address.

When you submit a request, we ask our library friends from all of the state, region, country, or the world if we could borrow their copy, and they will loan us the book or scan a copy of their journal article. In exchange, we loan our books and scan articles here for other libraries.  Last year alone, ATU students, faculty, and staff borrowed 475 items from other libraries.  We also lent 1933 items to libraries all over the world.

If you need a book or article we don’t have, you can fill out this simple request form or email our ILL office at ill@atu.edu.

Alternatively, if you searching for something in our main library database, Find It, and can’t find it, try clicking the filter dropdown Held By Library and select Libraries Worldwide.  This initiates a search for the title found at other libraries.

Once you find your item, click on the Title.  You will see the Access Option: Request Item through Interlibrary Loan:

This will immediately fill out the ILL request form with most of the required fields, making this a faster method to request materials.

You will find this option available in many subject databases like Academic Search Complete for articles without an immediate full-text PDF or link.

When you see Access Options: “Check Find It for Availability or Request through interlibrary loan,” you should FIRST select “Check Find It”—this will search our main library database in case we have full-text available through another provider.

If we still do not have full-text, you’ll be presented with another option: “Request Item through Interlibrary Loan.”

Click this button will also fill out most of the required fields on the ILL request form, saving you time.

For more information about this remarkable service, visit the ILL Homepage or watch this video tutorial on how it all works.

If you are looking for a good beach read (even if you are miles from the beach), take a look at our newest selections in Popular Reading:

Heated Rivalry / by Rachel Reid

See what all the buzz is about by reading the source material for the hit Netflix series about rival hockey players heating up the ice with their steamy love affair. This book is actually the second in the Game Changer series—the library has the first three volumes in the Popular Reading Collection.  But if you were hoping to listen to it on a long road trip, we also have all seven books in the series through the Libby

Operation Bounce House / by Matt Dinniman

If you liked the hit series, Dungeon Crawler Carl, check out this stand-alone adventure of a planetary colonist fighting to save his family ranch from Earth-bound gamers piloting AI robots to carry out eviction orders. It’s a perfect read who like their science-fiction with a side of comedy.

Innamorata / by Ava Reid

If fantasy is more your thing, check out this lush, gothic romance set in a magical world of necromancers, conquerors, and forbidden libraries. Don’t worry—this library won’t forbid you from checking out this gorgeous book.

Woman Down / by Colleen Hoover

This latest thriller from the best-selling author features a crime novelist trying to find inspiration with a quiet cabin retreat. When Detective Nathaniel Saint shows up with disturbing news, she finds out her new source of inspiration comes with a serious cost.

Half His Age / by Jennette McCurdy

Author of I’m Glad My Mom Died has a new novel about a seventeen-year-old girl struggling to be seen and loved, navigating her desires for her much older creative writing teacher. This coming-of-age novel has been described by Los Angeles Times as “a thorny examination of power, lust, shame and rage.”

More Weight : a Salem Story

This graphic novel explores the history of the Salem witch trials through hand-drawn illustrations depicting the events of the trial as well as its impact throughout history.

Explore more best sellers, thrillers, romances, horror, and drama in our Popular Fiction Collection on the first floor of the library.  If you are currently enjoying the sun and surf elsewhere, check out Libby for more fun fiction through digital audiobook or ebook.

Follow us on  Instagram and Facebook for new updates to our collections or check out our New Book Collection for more new arrivals.

Happy Spring Break!

The event will begin at 5:30 with a reception and meet-and-greet sponsored by ATU Black Student Association and the ATU Black Faculty and Staff Organization.   At 6:00 PM, she will give a talk as part of the Ross Pendergraft Library’s Author Series.  These events are free and open to all.

Ayana Gray is the author of three young adult fiction novels and one adult novel.  Her debut young adult novel, Beasts of Prey, was published in 2021, and became a New York Times bestseller.  It is now optioned for a film adaptation by Netflix.  The success of Beasts of Prey led to two more books in the trilogy called Beasts of Ruin and Beasts of War.

Her most recent publication, I Medusa, was released in 2025 as her first adult novel and re-imagines the tale of Medusa from Greek mythology.  It debuted as no. 13 on the New York Times bestseller list.

A native of Atlanta, Georgia, she moved to Little Rock at age 13 and graduated from the University of Arkansas in 2015.  She currently lives and writes in Little Rock.  Her forthcoming book, Hawk and Sparrow, will be published in September of 2026.

Dog Ear Books will be on hand to sell copies of her novels.  Please join us on the 19th to meet Ayana Gray, get copies of your books signed, and enjoy a night filled with stories, inspiration and connection.

For more events at the Ross Pendergraft Library & Technology Center, follow us on  Instagram and Facebook.

Each film begins at 7:00 PM in the Doc Bryan Student Services Lecture Hall at 1605 Coliseum Drive.  A Q&A session covering themes and topics from the film’s selector follows each screening. Here are this year’s selections and dates:

• Tuesday, March 3: “Waiting for Dalì” (Spanish)
• Wednesday, March 4: “Princess Mononoke” (Japanese)
• Thursday, March 5: “The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser” (German)
• Tuesday, March 10: “Delicious” (French)
• Wednesday, March 11: “My Brothers Dream Awake” (Spanish)
• Thursday, March 12: “Spirited Away” (Japanese)
• Monday, March 16: “When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit” (German)
• Tuesday, March 17: “The Mystery of Henri Pick” (French)

This is the 11^th anniversary of the film festival which features selections chosen by the ATU World Languages faculty showcasing films in their respective languages.  Students taking Spanish, Japanese, German, or French have an opportunity to immerse themselves in the language through these films.

However, the festival is open to all students who might enjoy films in general or are just looking for something free and fun to do with their friends on a weeknight in Russellville.

To learn more about the films and watch their trailers, visit the International Film Festival website: http://filmfest.atu.edu.  If you missed any of the films and would like to watch them at home, most are available at the library on DVD or via streaming video.  You can search the film titles in our library database, Find It.

For more events at the Ross Pendergraft Library & Technology Center, follow us on  Instagram and Facebook

What Is Consensus?

Consensus is a search engine for academic content that uses artificial intelligence to provide summaries of a given result set that may provide insight, answers, or a ‘consensus’ of highly-cited academic research on a given topic.  It claims to make academic searching easier and less time-consuming for busy researchers.

How Do I Create An Account?

Tech users can create an account with Consensus using their atu.edu email.  This will automatically grant them Consensus enterprise level account status from now until next year.  If users have already created an account with their atu.edu email, users will see the premium icon in the bottom, left-corner of the Consensus homepage:

The current trial enables users to have unlimited Pro searches, unlimited Study Snapshots, and 50 Deep Searches a month.

What Content Does Consensus Search?

Unlike general search engines like Google, Consensus will only search academic articles and peer-reviewed studies.  It uses sources like Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Pubmed, and its own collections licensed through other academic publishers.  Some of the results include preprint versions of articles before they were peer-reviewed and published elsewhere. According to their website, users can search over 220 million peer-reviewed articles. While most results will be comprised of open access content, it may also include articles with abstracts only or restricted access.  These articles can be searched by title or DOI in the library’s search engine for immediate full-text access or access through Interlibrary Loan.  You can see some illustrations of their included content at their dashboard.

How Do I Use It?

Like any search engine, the website features an open search box where users can query the database.  It supports both semantic searching and structured, Boolean searching.  A semantic search, like a whole phrase or question, searches for synonyms and contextual meaning rather than the exact search terms.  A Boolean search will give you a more precise result set featuring articles using exact keywords, and the ability to recognize operators like AND, OR, and NOT, as well as quotation marks for phrase-searching.

If you ask Consensus a “Yes” or “No” question, this will activate a meter which will synthesize results from the top 20 papers to provide an illustration of where academic consensus on your question would fall:

View their Best Practices page to get more out of your Consensus search.

What Makes Consensus Different Than Other Academic Search Engines?

Like all academic search engines, Consensus uses search filters to help users refine results.  It also ranks results by relevancy to your search query.  It does have a few features that make it stand out:

• The first twenty results of every search are summarized to give a broad overview of the result set.
• Consensus uses citation count, recency, and journal impact in result ranking.
• Users can use an embedded chatbot to ask questions about an individual paper.
• Paper “Snapshots” provide a quick list of a study’s methods, sample sizes, population, location, outcomes, and results.
• Advanced filters on study methods, citation count, sample size, duration, and journal ranking are available.
• Users can create a table, draft outlines, or upload other papers to analyze, summarize, or query.

Unlike the Library’s collection of databases, it cannot access our own licensed content, nor can it search across our own premium collections.  It also lacks robust controlled vocabulary searching features (subject searching).

Additionally, some library databases from Ebsco and Proquest already include article summarization in their results.  JSTOR users with individual accounts can also access a “Chat With A Paper” feature and view an AI summarization of the first twenty results.

Should I Trust Consensus?

While this search engine cannot hallucinate by fabricating citations (like ChatGPT), it can provide misleading summaries of real articles.  Researchers should treat any AI-generated summary with the same skepticism reserved for any second-hand source of information.  It can leave out important details or misinterpret results.

Students should also be made aware that copying an AI-generated summarization without attribution can constitute plagiarism.  They should review the Academic Integrity policies of ATU or discuss using this content with their professor.

Interested users should review their Security and Privacy Policies before creating an account.  While the product claims to not use customer data to train AI models or sell data to third-parties, it is still a private company, and individuals should carefully assess risks to their data and privacy before creating accounts.

What’s the Consensus On Consensus?

We want to know your feedback and experiences using this new tool—good or bad.  As artificial intelligence changes the way we learn and conduct research, it is important to use these opportunities to be curious, be skeptical, and be responsible in our practices.   If you want to give us your impressions on the tool, or if you have additional questions or concerns about using it, reach out to the library by contacting us via email at askus@atu.libanswers.com.

Prepare to be totally creeped out this Wednesday, October 29^th at 6:00 P.M. in RPL 300B as we welcome a guest presentation from Amy Milliken on the spooky stories and folklore centered around several historic buildings at Arkansas Tech University.

Amy Milliken is the Education Outreach Coordinator at the Department of Arkansas Heritage. She will share not only historical information about the buildings and grounds, but she will also separate the myths from the facts behind the campus’s most famous ghosts and ghost stories.

This event is free and open to the public.  For more information about the event, contact Luke Heffley at 479-964-0546 or lheffley@atu.edu.

Try the APA Manual Online

Available for a limited time to all ATU users, the APA Style Manual Online features the searchable full-text of the entire manual, cover to cover.  Users can navigate by page number, table of contents, and use the search box to find out how they might cite an Instagram post.

The APA Manual Online also includes “Lessons” to guide you through common topics like citing Journal Article References, Citing References In Text, or using Direct Quotations and Paraphrases.

By creating an optional personal login, you can also bookmark sections, highlight phrases and paragraphs, and add your own notes to different areas of the manual.  The Manual is also mobile friendly and looks great on a smartphone or a tablet.

For more information on the features of APA Manual Online, you can view this video tutorial of all of the features:

If you like what you see in the APA Manual Online, give us your feedback by emailing us at askus@atu.libanswers.com.  You can also call us, text us, chat at us via the Ask Us webpage.

Remember, you have until October 14^th to try this out!  For all other databases, including new databases, see our A-Z Databases Page for library resources fit for your next bibliography.

A retired librarian and teacher who lives in Yell County, Janet Ake is the author of several novels including Her Beautiful Mind, Daughter of Three Suns, and Ice Mountain: A Beauty and the Beast Retelling.  Her latest novel, The Last Protector, is a post-apocalyptic fantasy novel that tells the story of Ezander and his fight to survive a desert wasteland and save the woman he loves.

Come meet the author, ask questions, and enter a chance to win a free copy of her latest book, The Last Protector.  Entry is free and open to the public.

For more events at the Ross Pendergraft Library & Technology Center, follow us on  Instagram and Facebook. You can also contact Luke Heffley, special projects coordinator for Pendergraft Library, at (479) 964-0546 or lheffley@atu.edu for more information about the RPL Author Series.

When Google is not enough and valid sources are hosted behind paywalls, the Arkansas Traveler project can make it possible for school children, college students, faculty researchers, and ordinary Arkansans to access scholarly articles, educational videos, language instruction, and thousands of ebooks on a variety of subjects.

So what’s included?  Here’s a short list of our most popular resources provided by the Arkansas Traveler Program:

• ProQuest Central – A multidisciplinary one-stop database covering scholarly journal articles, periodicals, videos, disssertations & theses, newspapers, and more.
• ProQuest One Business – A large business database encompassing millions of full-text items including company reports, industry reports, scholarly articles, and more.
• ProQuest One Literature – The largest database we have for literature. Includes literary criticism, biography, and full-text access to more than 500,000 works of poetry, drama, and prose.
• Pronunciator – A language learning application that includes step-by-step lesson plans for 163 languages, ESL courses, and American Sign Language courses. It includes an app to keep track of your progress without an owl.
• Research Companion – A series of videos, tools, and resources to help students do more effective research, evaluate sources, and synthesize that research into their own papers.
• Ebook Central – A multidisciplinary collection of ebooks. While some are provided by ATU, many of the ebooks in this collection are provided from the Traveler program

Many other resources are funded by the Traveler program.  To see which ones, go to our A-Z databases page, and look for the blue icon: “ASL Traveler.”

Funding for this program is made possible by a grant from the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services to the Arkansas State Library under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act.  For more on the Arkansas Traveler program, visit their FAQ page or Ask Your Librarian.

https://questionpro.com/t/ADooIZ3L5d

Tell us how the library’s collections, services, and spaces mattered to YOU in 2024.  If you’ve ever used our website or stepped foot in the Ross Pendergraft Library & Technology Center, we want to hear what you think about your library.  The survey has been redesigned so you can finish faster and get back to studying for midterms.

Have you ever wanted something different in the library?  More study spaces?  More books?  Less noise? An entirely new floor with a cafeteria and espresso machine?

From now until March 21^st, when the survey closes, is your chance to let us know how we can improve and what we’re doing right.

As a direct result of your feedback on past surveys, we’ve made a lot of changes already:

• You wanted more comfortable seating and more places in the library to study, so last summer, we renovated a part of the first floor, removed or relocated some outdated books, and added booth seating and study cubicles—creating more study spaces with more attractive, private, and comfortable seating.
• Many of you said you wanted audiobooks on Libby, so we now have almost 600 of them through the Libby app. Now you can have more debates with your friends about whether listening to an audiobook counts as “reading.”
• Snacks are now allowed! Just keep Dorito dust off the books.
• We added a water bottle refill station on the first floor, near the restrooms.
• Some of you said we want to stay more informed about the library, so we increased the quality and frequency of our social media presence.
• We added a supply vending machine to get last minute scantrons, charging cables, and playing cards to get through the late-night study sessions.
• Every year, we hear that you want more quality journal access, and every year, we try to deliver. This past year, we expanded JSTOR and added access to local and state newspapers with America’s News.
• You told us some of the computers were getting slower, so we upgraded the Apple computers on the third floor and added docking stations to every floor so you can bring your laptop and plug and play (thanks to our good friends in the Office of Information Systems).
• We can all agree the elevators were sometimes unreliable. Thankfully, they are now getting replaced.
• Finally, many of you wanted a shorter survey to get through. Take it now and time us—we think it’s faster, but you tell us.

We hope you will continue to tell us what we do best and what we can do better on this year’s survey.  If you want a more direct approach, send us a text, email, or chat.  If you prefer the socials, we can be found on Facebook and Instagram.  No matter how you do it, let us know how we can make your library better.