If you are anything like me, you know the pain of losing points on your Works Cited page after all the hard work you put into writing a good paper.

Let the library blog help you keep all those citation points this semester, my little grasshoppers! Cass’s favorite tools for good (usually) and easy (certainly) citations:

BibMe creates citations for you. The clear interface will create MLA or APA citations for articles, newspapers, books, websites, films. The ISBN search option for books is so slick!

EbscoHost creates citations directly from your search results! Whether you’re using Academic Search Premier or any of the other fine Ebsco databases, just select “Email” and for the article you want, select the appropriate format (e.g. MLA, APA) and it will send you the citation. Amazing!

Reference Librarians know all about citations, just ask!

In too deep? An appointment at the Writing Center might be the right move.

What are your favorite citation helpers?

Bring your study questions and your appetite to Finals Freakout in Coe Library Monday, April 28th from 8:00 – 10: p.m. Librarians will have cookies, coffee, iced tea and study aids ready for you!

[image via threadless... it's funny because it's true]

The following class meets in the Coe Library Electronic Classroom Monday:

• 9:00 – 10:50 a.m. ENGL 5000 (Hix)

And don’t forget to stop by for some cookies and coffee at Finals Freakout, 8:00 – 10:00 p.m. in Coe Library!

UW offers a whole slate of interesting events today in honor of our great planet.

If you want to extend Earth Day to every day, stop by the library to read more. And I will try to remember, if you will, to think twice before printing online articles.

Professors and scholars can now expect their unpublished articles to be tested for plagiarism via software commonly used to check student work, reports the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Students may be familiar with the turnitin software which scans papers for familiar turns of phrase and known published material. Now professors can expect their papers to be subjected to a very similar process.

In the past, peer review prior to publication ensured the quality of research articles, but now journal publishers are utilizing technology to ensure original content. Additional methods of detecting plagiarism include Google Alerts and database searches.

This article reminded me that while technological advances can make plagiarism easy and appealing, they also make it a heck of a lot easier to get caught. It also reminded me that setting up permanent searches in your favorite databases and on Google is a great idea!

As national library week wraps up, here is a quick glance at what happens each week in Wyoming libraries:

- Library doors are open a total of 2,487 hours

- There are 63,093 patron visits (equivalent to 1 out of every 8 people in the state)

- Staff answer 11,222 reference questions

- 83,467 items circulate — 30,408 of which are children’s materials

- There are 19,534 uses of public access computers

- 645 library employees work 17,338 hours

Statistics compiled by the amazing Susan Vittitow at the Wyoming State Library, 4-17-2008 via ACPL

Stop by the Coe Library reference desk this week to pick up your free copy of Maus.

Now is the perfect time to read the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel — author Art Spiegelman visits Laramie at the end of this month.

Once you’ve read it, tell us what you thought!

Do you have questions about the new NIH public access policy? Wondering how it will affect UW researchers and authors?

Librarian David Kruger explains what University of Wyoming folks need to know about the recent announcement that NIH-funded research must be made publicly available after one year via the PubMed database.

According to Kruger:

What is the NIH Public Access Policy, in plain English?

A law-enforced requirement that any peer-reviewed article supported by NIH funding be made freely available to the public via PubMed Central, no later than 12 months after the official publication date.

What is the impact of the NIH Public Access Policy on UW Investigators and Authors?

The NIH public access policy goes into effect April 7, 2008. Journal articles resulting from NIH-funded activities submitted for publication on or after this date must be deposited in the publicly accessible PubMed Central within 12 months after the journal article is published. Authors submitting articles for journal publication must retain the right to make the article publicly available. The UW Research Office has provided both a UW copyright agreement letter and a UW copyright amendment to the publication agreement. Both of these documents should be sent to the publisher.