WCC Library Blog

NC LIVE has released 24 new PBS videos for their PBS Video Collection (http://media.nclive.org/video_home.phtml).  Included in the new release are Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park, and Persuasion as well as Ken Burns’ The War, Dickens’s Oliver Twist, King Lear and more.  There are many other PBS videos that are already a part of the collection that you can watch.  Also, the video collection interface has been upgraded and you are now able to create a URL link of a video to put in Blackboard or on another webpage.  If you have any questions or comments about the PBS video collection, please contact us at 739-6891 or at wcc-library@waynecc.edu.

On Tuesday, July 6^th, NC LIVE will reveal   its new and improved homepage interface for everyone to use.  This new homepage has been available in a beta version as a link on the NC LIVE website since the beginning of the 2010.

Changes to NC LIVE include an expanded list of subject categories for the databases, new offerings in e-books, audio books and databases, as well as new business and job portals.

Visit the new NC LIVE homepage by using the NC LIVE link at the top of our Research Databases drop-down menu on the WCC Library homepage. If you have any questions or comments about the new NC LIVE webpage, please contact us at 739-6891 or at wcc-library@waynecc.edu.

The WCC Library features two book exhibits for July 2010.  The main exhibit area’s books focus on American History, particularly the founders of the American Revolution and, eventually, the United States.  For more information about American History and some great photographs and audio presentations about various periods and people in U.S. history, visit the American Memory site at the Library of Congress.

Books in the WCC Library newspaper exhibit area for July highlight Beach Reads, since July is a month when many people go to the beach and may need something new and exciting to read.  We have a variety of books from Nicholas Sparks novels to some great Young Adult fiction.  If you’re looking for a beach to visit, North Carolina has plenty of sand to lure you.  We’ll help you find a book to take with you; these websites will help you decide on a destination:

- The Outer Banks

- The Cape Fear Coast

- The Crystal Coast

- The Brunswick Islands

On Thursday, June 10^th the Secretary of the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources held a press conference in the WCC Library to announce that the WCC Library had received a Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) grant of $19,986 from the State Library of North Carolina.

This money will be spent to update and expand the library’s book collections in the LC subject areas of applied, business and computer technology.  For example, many new books about sustainable agriculture and computer and video game design will not only complement new college programs, but help people looking for jobs, or to improve their job knowledge and skills, in these high profile areas.  For more information about LSTA grants for 2010-2011, visit the NC Department of Cultural Resources website.

The WCC Library book exhibit for June anticipates the Dog Days of Summer.    This saying comes to us from astronomy and a star named Sirius (which means Dog Star).  The Dog Days start in early July and usually end in early September.  For more information about Dog Days visit this website from Cornell University.

Naturally our Dog Days of Summer exhibit highlights books about dogs: from children’s books, to books about special dogs, to books regarding care of your dog. To learn more information about dog breeds, or how to deal with your dog, visit the dog guide and the dog breed selector from the Animal Planet website.

The second WCC Library book exhibit for May 2010 commemorates Memorial Day.  Observed on various dates in the Spring at the local and state level since the 1860s in the United States, Decoration Day was originally a day devoted to placing flowers on graves of soldiers who died in the American Civil War.  Declared a national holiday in 1971, and by then expanded to honor the dead in all American wars, Memorial Day has traditionally been celebrated on May 30th, but recently it has been designated to occur on the last Monday of the month of May.  To find out more information about Memorial Day, visit the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs website.  This website gives you the history of Memorial Day and other pertinent information.

The first WCC Library book exhibit for May 2010 celebrates Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month, with its theme of “Leadership to Meet the Challenge of a Changing World.”  Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month was first observed in May of 1990 when George H.W. Bush officially declared Asian-Pacific Heritage Week to be expanded to a month-long celebration.  To find out more about the Asian-Pacific cultures and their heritage, visit the Library of Congress’s Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month website, as well as Duke University’s Asian Pacific Studies Institute, providing links to both the Insitute’s library resources and the North Carolina Japan Center.

This month’s library exhibits highlight two important celebrations during April.

Every April National Poetry Month focuses on poetry and its place in American culture.  Poets.org from the Academy of American Poets offers many opportunities to help celebrate this month.  On April 29^th you can observe Poem in Your Pocket Day.  Also, you can sign up to receive a Poem-A-Day each day of the month that will be sent directly to your e-mail inbox.

National Library Week is commemorated from April 11th-17th, but at the WCC Library we will be celebrating all month long.  National Library Week is an annual recognition of the contributions of our nation’s libraries and librarians.  In addition to festivities for the week, the American Library Association has also set aside some of the days to celebrate other areas of librarianship.  Tuesday April 13^th commemorates National Library Workers Day.  Wednesday April 14^th will celebrate the first annual National Bookmobile Day.  Also, on that Wednesday, ALA will announce the “Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2009” on the Office for Intellectual Freedom’s website.  Finally on Thursday, April 15th, join with YALSA for Support Teen Literature day by reading a book that won an ALA award for 2010 or your favorite young adult book.

The newest additions to the WCC Library’s resources are online film collections.  Faculty users have the option of adding these videos to their Blackboard classroom sites for easy viewing. We have a great tutorial with instructions for searching either of the video streaming resources and adding links to a Blackboard Course page so students can watch the films for an assignment. 

Films on Demand is a web-based digital video delivery service that allows you to view streaming videos from Films Media Group.  There are more than 5,500 educational titles in dozens of subject areas. 

American History in Video includes more than 2,000 hours of streaming video and more than 5,000 titles in all.  Included in this collection are more than 1,000 hours of newsreel footage from the 1890s to the 1980s.  Also, included are documentaries from companies like the History Channel. The above tutorial also contains information about linking these videos to your Blackboard classroom site.

Theatre in Video contains more than 250 of the world’s most important plays, together with approximately 100 video documentaries. These videos include a number of Shakespeare productions and famous play productions with famous actors like Orson Welles. 

Contact us by phone at 919-739-6891, or ext. 6891 on-campus, or by email at wcc-library@waynecc.edu for assistance in using any of these film collections, or with any other research questions!

One of our newest databases is Nursing@Ovid, full of timely and authoritative information for nursing faculty and students. Full-text content of over sixty nursing journals can be cross-searched or browsed in this new database.  Two other medical databases, CINAHL & HealthSource Nursing and  Stat!Ref are also linked to Nursing@Ovid for simultaneous searching using the single interface. 

A particularly interesting feature of Nursing@Ovid is the electronic journal tables of contents (eTOCs) option. With eTOCs you can track changes in a selected journal’s table of contents, or be notified when the newest issue is available to view, by setting up your own RSS feed or e-mail alert. Visit the WCC library webpage to access this database, as well as one or more of the many other research databases now available.

For more information about using any of these databases, or with any other research questions, contact us by phone at 919-739-6891, or ext. 6891 on-campus, or by email at wcc-library@waynecc.edu!