The “Ask the Librarians!” pull-out tab (located on the right side of many of the libraries’ web pages) has been revised so that it defaults to our chat service.  Previously, it had offered a form that patrons could fill out and submit.

This will allow our patrons to connect with assistance in real-time from almost any of our web pages, giving us the opportunity to help them when and where they need it on our site. Chat service is staffed almost 24/7 – with service provided by MU librarians and graduate assistants during the weekdays and by a third-party chat service after hours and on weekends.

Many thanks to Judy and Mathew for updating our pages.

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Rhonda

The Staff Picks display is up near the Reference Desk. Because we picked great items, some were already checked out, but the recommendations may encourage some requests from other campuses, MOBIUS, etc.

Thanks for participating and for choosing such a wide variety of books and movies!

–Jen Gravley

Please participate in our upcoming Staff Picks display!

Recommend any circulating item (book, DVD, etc.) from our collection for a Staff Picks display. Your recommendation will be attached to the item to pique interest. Contact Jennifer Gravley (gravleyjy@missouri.edu) with your pick. Let her know how you’d like to be identified (name, title/dept., etc.) and preferably include a line or two about why you enjoyed it, who might be interested in it, etc. There are also blank forms at the reference desk if you’d like to handwrite your recommendation.

Deadline extended to January 10^th.

 

Please participate in our upcoming Staff Picks display!

Recommend any circulating item (book, DVD, etc.) from our collection for a Staff Picks display. Your recommendation will be attached to the item to pique interest. Contact Jennifer Graveley (gravleyjy@missouri.edu) with your pick and personal recommendation. On the “recommended by” line, put your first name, full name, title, department—however you’d like to be identified.

Please get your recommendation in by January 6^th.

Please continue to check out and use existing recordings and tutorials as you work with students and faculty. We continue to update and create more tutorials and recordings, but please let me know if you need any particular topic covered, and if you have suggestions for improvement or for additional topics. If there are tutorials you created that you use but are not listed here, feel free to share them and I will include them where appropriate. Also, please let me know if you have E-Learning project ideas you would like to discuss as you teach and/or work with students, faculty, and staff.

https://libraryguides.missouri.edu/RecordingsAndTutorials

The Ellis Library Reference Desk is now a voter registration place. 

To vote in the November presidential elections, Missouri voters must be registered by Wednesday, Oct 12^th!

Please encourage students, staff and community members to register within the next three weeks if they have not already done so!

RAIS said a fond farewell to Goodie Bhullar who retired on June 29^th.  We wish her every happiness and hope to see her at many library events in the future.  Until we hire, Goodie’s duties will be distributed to other individuals in the RAIS Division.    

Interim Head of Instructional Services – Cindy Cotner
Co-Chairs for the Instruction Team – Noel Kopriva and Kimberly Moeller
SISLT TA Supervisor —  Rhonda Whithaus
Instruction Statistics – Rhonda Whithaus
Geography Liaison – Sandy Schiefer
South Asian Studies Liaison – Rachel Brekhus
Writing Tutors Contact – Noel Kopriva

As mentioned in earlier announcements, we are hiring a temporary Reference & Instructional Librarian to help with reference desk hours and classroom instruction.  Cindy will be working with the Instruction Team and others in RAIS to manage our instructional services.  Thanks to everyone who is helping!  If you have questions about anything related to Goodie’s responsibilities, please contact Cindy or Jeannette.

For two weeks following Spring Break (March 31 – April 12) three graduate students from Ellis Reference will be roving throughout Ellis Library several hours per day (and some night /weekend hours) assisting users in the stacks.  These graduate students –  who usually answer questions seated at the Reference Desk –  will instead spend their Reference Desk shift “on the move!”  This will be a two-week pilot project with the hope of an extended version during the fall semester. The graduate students will wear library badges and carry an iPad so they can answer questions quickly and efficiently. With changes from Renew Mizzou starting to occur, this seems like an ideal time to take Reference assistance into the stacks to the users!

The Ellis Reference Department just finished research workshops for international students. These workshops were offered both on weekdays as well as on consecutive Saturdays. The Saturday workshops were very popular. Workshops included Exploring MU Libraries; Finding Books using the MERLIN Catalog and Google Books; Finding Articles using MU article databases and Google Scholar; and Writing your Paper and Citing Your Sources. We collaborated with the International Center to publicize these workshops.