University Library News and Updates

Spring Term Updates from the Library

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.