In thirty seconds we can get a gourmet cup of coffee from a Kureg coffee machine.
In two minutes a bowl of ramen noodles can be heated up in the microwave.
And in just one click, a frantic college student can pull together an essay in a matter of minutes.
In today’s world, we like everything fast, easy to use, and right at our fingertips. Technology does that and it can benefit every citizen across the globe because people love to get data quickly from everything from ebooks to music to videos to yes–even school work.
Come follow me as I explore the Union Parish Library for today’s #Technology Tuesday into one my favorite databases, EPSCO Host! What is EBSCO Host you ask? Well EBSCOhost, supplies is a fee-based online research service with 375 full-text databases, a collection of 600,000-plus ebooks, subject indexes, point-of-care medical references, and an array of historical digital archives. The good news is that for those of us living in Louisiana–it’s free through the library! And even more importantly to write a paper, research an essay, or gather data for a class assignment—it’s quick, easy, and at my fingertips–just like a college student likes it!
Patrons can go to www.unionparishlibrary.com and click on links. Once you see links, begin to arrow down and click on Academic Educational Databases.
The Louisiana Library Connection website is the second website you will see once you click on Academic Educational Databases. Click on book index with reviews and you will see an EBSCO Host icon. EBSCO host is very useful for me as a ULM college student doing assignments, but it’s really good for anyone seeking reliable data! You can even look up cd’s of your favorite music artist. Just type in a name in the search box such as Elvis Presley and you will see a lot of Elvis Presley’s music along with the price, the name of the artist, publisher, date and genre.
Books tell a story and patrons can look up biographies for assignments or just to learn about your favorite hero such as John Wayne. EBSCO Host also has a tools category where you can cite an article using nine formats. The one I use most often for school is the American Psychology Association or APA. It lists the name of the magazine which is Official John Wayne, publishing year, title which is John Wayne Almanac: A Comprehensive Guide to Duke’s Movies, Quotes, Achievements and More. All this data is easy to access whether for school or just for an afternoon of browsing.
The best thing about EBSCO Host is that it allows you to print. When I had a memo to do in one of my public administration classes, I picked the article and printed it out and I also printed the APA Style format references page to use on my bibliography page. Emailing the article is a good tool also because people that like a certain topic can send it to a friend or students in a group study. Saving citations to a file formatted for any type of bibliographic management software such as Easy Bib, End Note, Pro Cite, Reference Manager and Zotero saves time, but I suggest copying and pasting the Style format references page and printing it out. Remember to staple it to your article of choice.
Finally, EBSCO Host offers the public numerous articles for respectable publishers. In the world of “fake news” it’s not always easy to tell what stories are real and which ones are grounded in facts. All of EBSCO information is reviewed for accuracy which is one of the reasons academic institutions rely on this data for research purposes. As a student myself pursuing a degree in public administration, the Public Administration Review found in EBSCO has been very helpful because it has a lot of government related articles about ethics, social services and public affairs. EBSCO Host is very private and safe to use for everybody.
In a world where we are driven by technology…having a research library at the tips of my fingertips is not only easy and fast—for a college student, it’s better than chicken ramen noodles and a cup of french vanilla coffee!
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