University Library News and Updates

Check out the library's newest resources: 

Access Medicine 

A collection of medical learning resources featuring hundreds of books, review questions, cases, videos, podcasts, infographics, interactive 3D modules and more across the basic sciences and clinical specialties.

The following sites are also available:  

• AccessNeurology 
• AccessPharmacy
• AccessPharmacy 
• AccessPhysiotherapy

ClinicalKey

Provides streamlined access to evidence-based information for clinicians, delivering quick answers at the point of care. ClinicalKey features over 1,000 medical books published by Elsevier, including essential texts such as Gray's Anatomy, Rang & Dale's Pharmacology, and Goldman’s Cecil Medicine. It also offers access to more than 650 journals, 3,000 drug monographs, and 4,500 practice guidelines. Users can efficiently search and filter resources by source type, study type, specialty, and publication date.

JAMA Network

Enhanced access to the research, reviews, and perspectives shaping the future of medicine in the Journal of the American Medical Associtation (JAMA) and its 9 associated journals: JAMA Cardiology, Dermatology, Health Forum, Internal Medicine, Neurology, Oncology, Ophthalmology, Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery, Pediatrics, Psychiatry and Surgery.

JAMA Evidence

JAMAevidence is an online portal to valuable JAMA EBM resources, such as the Users' Guide to the Medical Literature and the Rational Clinical Examination. In addition, it contains calculators, a guide to statistics and methods, and a glossary.

UptoDate

Is a physician-authored clinical decision support resource used to make point-of-care decisions. More than 5,100 physician authors, editors and peer reviewers have synthesized the most recent medical information into evidence-based recommendations to improve patient care and quality. 

All of the databases are accessible using the Databases A-Z link on the library homepage. 

Welcome New and Returning Students 

We're excited to start the Fall 2025 term, and have a lot of news to share with you! We encourage you to check out our Welcome Week activities, sign up for an informative webinar, or get assistance with our peer and expert coaching services, and 1:1 research consultations. Keep checking back as we'll have more news throughout the semester to share about upcoming events, new resources, time saving tips and more!

Welcome Week:  September 2-6

Unlock the Code and Win!

Fall Welcome Week kicks off the first week of September with an exciting virtual escape room: Library Lockdown. Test your skills by solving 4 fun challenges to unlock the code and disable the library’s security AI bot—plus, discover valuable library features for your studies. 

Everyone that participates in the virtual escape room by September 6 @ 11:59pm will be entered into a drawing to win $25 Amazon gift cards. We're giving away 2 per campus, including online.  Go to the Library Lockdown escape room now!  

“Looking Forward to the Future” 

Interested in writing a letter to your future self? Paper and envelopes will be provided at each library location, providing an opportunity to reflect on how you’re feeling at the start of your journey at the Chicago School and share your goals and aspirations. Once finished, seal your letter to open upon graduation—a meaningful way to capture your hopes and growth over the years. Online students can join in too! Use https://www.futureme.org/ to write a letter to your future self and choose the delivery date!

Stop by the Library

Grab some snacks, refreshments, and back-to-school supplies at each of our physical locations during Welcome Week, while they last. And while you're visiting, say hi to the friendly library staff and learn about library services and resources. 

We're also excited to share the latest edition of the library's student-created Zine, Checked out, is now available. Click here to view, or pick up a copy in the library!

Attend a Webinar

Whether you're looking to improve your search skills, learn about new tools that can help your research process, or want to know more about navigating the complexities of Generative AI use, the library has a fall webinar for you! Webinars generally run 40-50 minutes, and are all posted in Central (CT) time. 

A few topics offered this term: 

• Using AI in Research 
• Research in Psychology and Social Sciences 
• Foundations of Information Literacy: Evaluating Research for Graduate Success 
• Information Literacy in an Age of Generative AI 
• Research Methods: Essential Resources & Tools  
• Savvy Search Tips: Finding Articles 

For the full range of fall topics and to register, check out the calendar at https://calendar.library.thechicagoschool.edu

Peer & Expert Coaching

Help is available! Make an appointment for online 1:1 tutoring and coaching for writing, statistics, research, and academic skills, or get asynchronous feedback and review of your writing and more:  Book a peer tutor or expert coach here

Happy New Year! We hope your Spring 2025 semester is going well so far. To kick off the start of the Spring term, we invite you to join us for Library Welcome Week January 13-January 18. Stop by for some treats*, meet library staff, & learn about helpful & time-saving library services. 

During Welcome Week, everyone, including online students, is also invited to participate in a drawing for $25 gift cards. To participate, take our Library Welcome Week Quiz to get entered into the drawing! Winners will be notified on January 21.  

Update:  The Los Angeles campus is moving Welcome Week to January 21-27th, due to the ongoing wildfires/ campus closure. 

*while supplies last 

Spring 2025 Library Webinars

Learn savvy research strategies, tools, and tips that can help you save valuable time and help you succeed in your studies in this webinar series presented by your expert librarians at The Chicago School Library. Topics include 

• Navigating the Library: Services and Resources  Wednesday, January 15 @ 7:00pm CT
• First Year Students in the Library Tuesday, January 28 @ 6:00pm CT
• Citation Management Thursday, February 6 @ 7:00 PM
• Savvy Searching: How to Find Relevant Peer Reviewed Articles Tuesday, February 11 @ 8:00pm CT 
• Database Spotlight: *NEW* ProQuest Psychology One Tuesday, February 18 @ 5:00pm CT
• Conducting a Literature Review Monday, February 24 @ 7:00pm CT
• Using AI in Research Wednesday, March 12 @ 12:00pm CT
• Navigating Misinformation: How to Evaluate Information Online Tuesday, March 18 @ 8:00pm CT
• Finding Tests and Measures for Your Dissertation Research Wednesday, March 26 @ 8:00pm CT

• Reading, Annotating, and Organizing Scholarly Articles Tuesday, April 1 @7:00pm CT

  Click here for more detailed information about the sessions, or to register!

Staff Updates

The Chicago School Library is pleased to welcome a new librarian to the team:  Elaine Mitra, Head of Access Services!

Based at the Chicago campus, she provides services to the entire Chicago School community, including managing the assessment library, loans, reserves or other material issues and needs.  She loves learning and helping people which is part of what spurred her to make the career change from working in advertising to librarianship. She graduated from The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in December 2023 with her MSLIS. Before joining the library team at The Chicago School, she  worked at DePaul University’s Loop Library. She grew up in Metro Detroit and then lived in Chicago since 2010 when she moved to Chicago for college at Loyola University. 

Outside the library she loves to read, watch movies, see live theater, and travel. Her door is open if you have any questions regarding library materials and things or want to chat!

New Resources

• ProQuest OnePsychology -designed to be “one-stop-shopping” for a variety of resources, supports multiple learning styles with essential, authoritative content spanning scholarly journals, therapy videos and counseling transcripts, with articles, news and ebooks covering psychological conditions, therapy, research concepts, tests and more in an all-inclusive, user-friendly interface. Learn more in the library’s upcoming webinar on Tuesday, February 18, @ 5:00 pm CT register here
• Cambridge Higher Education -An extensive collection of online textbooks from Cambridge University Press

Library User Voice Survey

Please take a few minutes to fill out the Library User Voice Survey.  Feedback from students, faculty, and staff at The Chicago School is valuable and helps us helps us prioritize development of new services and resources. 

In support of program development, The Community Solution Education System Libraries are seeking your help in evaluating the Cambridge Higher Education textbook collection.

Access URL: https://tcsedsystem.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://www.cambridge.org/highereducation/ 

This diverse textbook selection from Cambridge University Press covers a wide array of subjects including psychology, medicine, sociology, education, law, and more.

Trial Ends on: 10/31/2024

Feedback Form: https://tcsedsystem.libwizard.com/f/trial_feedback 

Please take some time to explore the database and let us know what you think!

We hope your first week of the Fall semester is going well. All of us at the Chicago School Library are looking forward to working with you this academic year!

To kick off the start of the Fall term, we invite you to join us for Library Welcome Week Tuesday Sept. 3, through Monday Sept. 9.  If you are located at a campus with a library, stop by for some treats,* meet library staff, & learn about helpful & time-saving  library services. 

During Welcome Week, everyone, including online students, is invited to a drawing for $10 gift cards*! To enter, take our Library Welcome Week Quiz! Winners will be notified on September 10. 

* -while supplies last

Webinars

If you are new to the library or need a refresher, register for our “Getting Started with The Chicago School University Library” webinar on Tuesday, Sept. 3 @ 8pm CT. 

Additional webinars on a variety of helpful topics include:

•  How to Find Peer-Reviewed Articles  Wednesday, 9/11 @ 8pm CT
• Database Spotlight: PsycINFO  Thursday, 9/19, 2024 @ 8pm CT
• Using AI in Research  Thursday, 9/26 @ 7pm CT
• PowerNotes: Organize & Write While you Research  Thursday, 10/3 @ 7pm CT
• Google Scholar | Tuesday, 10/8 @ 8pm CT
• and more! 

View the full schedule and register here!

Resources to Help You Get Started

Check out the library's helpful tutorials on topics such as how to use One Search, or searching library databases. 

Or take a look at our large selection of Research Guides, including subject specific guides with curated resources for your subject area, as well as how-to and topic guides to help with how to search, use Ai, citation management, evaluating scholarly sources, and so much more.  

The Chicago School University Library, in partnership with its colleagues at The Community Solution Education System, Pacific Oaks College, Saybrook University, Kansas College of Osteopathic Medicine, and the University of Western States, has decided to begin sunsetting our support for Refworks.

What is the Timeline?

Support will officially end on February 20th, 2025.

Why is the Library ending support for Refworks?

The usage of Refworks has always been very low. In the last five years, usage has continued to decline.  While usage of the service has declined, its cost has continued to increase, putting increasing pressure on the Library's budget. By moving away from Refworks, the Library will be able to reinvest funds into new services and resources better to meet the needs of The Chicago School Community.

Does this mean the library won't support Citation Managers at all?

Not at all! The Library has strengthened its commitment to using the open-access alternative Zotero. The Library already provides unlimited Zotero Storage for the entire Chicago School Community. You only need to use your institutional email to take advantage of the benefit. 

Why Zotero?

There are a lot of citation managers in the marketplace. Endnote and Refworks are both now owned by Clarivate, and Endnote, like RefWorks, is cost-prohibitive for institutions to provide. Mendeley is owned by Elsevier, which comes with concerns about the data collection policies that power Mendeley's social network. Additionally, Mendeley's word processing plugin does not work with the Chicago School's Microsoft 365 Services.  Moving to support Zotero also closely aligns with the library's desire to support systems that support easy dissemination and sharing of information and knowledge. We sincerely believe that Zotero is an excellent tool with great potential to make every student's, faculty's, and staff member's life a bit easier. At the end of the day, Zotero works well, has a very large community of users, and provides a great user experience (especially in its soon-to-be-released redesigned version!)

How can I export my citations to another citation manager if I'm currently using Refworks?

That is a great question! If you want to switch to Zotero, see the library's guide “How to Export Citations from RefWorks to Zotero”, which includes step-by-step instructions and a helpful video. If you prefer another citation manager, such as Mendeley or EndNote. The library's RefWorks guide provides instructions for the most popular citation managers.  If you need assistance with exporting your citations from RefWorks, you can also make an appointment with a librarian. We're committed to helping make the transition as seamless as possible. 

We hope that everyone has had a great start to their spring terms!

Here at The Chicago School University Library, we have been hard at work adding to our collections and expanding our services.

New members to the Library Team

First, we'd like to warmly welcome two individuals who've joined the library team: Monica West and Alix Curry!

Monica joins us as our new Research & Instruction Librarian, who helps engage the university community in research and instructional activities, particularly in the classroom and in one-on-one research consultations. While she is based in Los Angeles, she is available to help anyone at the University!

Alix joins us as our Access Services Associate, who helps maintain the daily operations of the library, including overseeing our wonderful student employees. She is physically based at the Los Angeles library location but supports the Library at the university level.

We would also like to welcome Mahagnie Morrison to her new position as our Access Services Librarian. She is now based in Chicago, but will continue to support the Library as a whole.

New Library Structure

In the fall of 2023, the University Library updated its operational structure to match professional best practices and improve our ability to serve The Chicago School community. We are moving to a model based on functional areas, which has seen the creation of two new library departments:

• Academic Engagement – oversees the library’s instructional and research support services.
• Resources & Discovery – oversees the resources and day-to-day operations of the library and ensures that library materials are findable. This department includes the Access Services unit, which oversees the checking in and out of books and other library materials.

This new structure means that all of the librarians and library support staff support the entirety of our university’s community rather than just a single physical location.

To learn more about these departments, look at our updated library directory page!

New Resources

Our community now has access to more resources than ever before, thanks to our acquisition of a new license to Sage Explorer! The library now provides full access to the following Sage databases:

• Sage Research Methods – The ultimate methods library with more than 1,000 books, reference works, journal articles, and instructional videos by world-leading academics from across the social sciences, including the largest collection of qualitative methods books available online from any scholarly publisher.
• Sage Skills – Designed to help students learn new skills and sharpen existing ones to assist in achieving academic success and preparing to enter the workforce.
• Sage Data – Contains billions of multidisciplinary, global statistics for research and instruction.
• Sage Business Cases – Fosters the needed skills and strategy for success beyond the ivory tower through unlimited access to the Sage business case collection.
• Sage Campus – Supports the teaching and learning of skills and research methods through 280+ hours of structured online learning. Self-paced and instructor-led online courses comprising an engaging mix of high-quality content, video, interactives, and formative assessments. Topics cover critical skills and research methods across all stages of academic study: information navigation, data literacy, research skills, data science skills, and publication.
• Sage Video – Cutting-edge streaming video available online and offline that supports teaching, learning, and research at all levels.
• Sage Academic Books – Research monographs, supplementary texts, and professional development titles.
• Sage Reference – Authoritative encyclopedias and handbooks in the social and behavioral sciences that serve as a strong foundation for academic research.
• CQ Press Library – Search or browse resources on American government, current affairs, history, politics, public policy, and data analysis for the social sciences.
• CQ Researcher – In-depth reports on today's issues.

Zotero Update

The Chicago School Library is excited to announce that it has procured unlimited storage for Zotero, one of the premier citation management platforms. To use the unlimited storage option, you must create an account using your institutional email address (@thechicagoschool.edu or @ego.thechicagoschool.edu). Once you have set up your account, you won’t have to worry about running out of space for citations or PDF files saved in Zotero! If you already have a Zotero account and used a different email address, you can update your Zotero account information with your institutional email and get the storage that way.

Introducing PowerNotes

If you are struggling with notetaking, check out the Library’s newly acquired tool, PowerNotes! This innovative browser tool can help you engage in helpful notetaking and can be especially useful if you are in the midst of a literature review!

2024 Library User Voice Survey

The library strives to improve and expand our offering of services through feedback from our user community – students, faculty, and staff. As a small library team, we can develop only so many new services at once, so we rely on the community to help us prioritize development.

While we can’t guarantee that the services in the survey will be offered in the near future, your survey responses help us allocate the needed librarians and library support staff to explore the feasibility and sustainability of new services.

The survey is short and shouldn’t take more than 5-10 minutes to complete!

Current Pilot Services

The library is currently piloting pick-up requests for items in our collection of psychological tests and measures in Chicago. As we learn more from the pilot, we hope to begin a slow rollout of testing material requests to other library locations starting in the fall semester.