Undergraduate Library Blog | Information and Updates on Getting the Most out of the UGL - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Underground Summer

Posted on May 13, 2013 by RAL

Hey, UGL-ers! Graduation is over, the Class of 2013 is on its way to becoming productive members of the “real world” and summer has arrived in Champaign-Urbana. Okay, so the last one might be a bit of a stretch, but even if it’s not beach-y outside, you can still get plenty of R-n-R at the library this summer.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons under the Creative Commons license

If you’re taking a little break during Summer I, don’t forget we have lots of stuff to keep you entertained: new books and movies are arriving regularly (check the New Book shelves on the upper level for our latest additions); we’ve got loads of video games; and don’t forget about our loanable tech items, too!

If you’re sticking around and taking classes during Summer I, we’ve got stuff for you, too! Our reference services will still be available for all of your research questions! This summer, we won’t have a librarian sitting at the Research Desk, but if you have a question about finding sources, using databases, locating statistics or boning up on background info, ask at the Circulation Desk, and they can get one of our “on call” librarians or graduate assistants to come out and help. Ask A Librarian chat service will also be available during Summer I.

Just as a reminder: The UGL will be open M-Th: 8:30am-6pm; F: 8:30am-5pm and Sa-Sun: 1pm-5pm. If you want to visit another library on campus this summer, check out the whole summer schedule.

Congrats, Grads!

Posted on May 9, 2013 by RAL

Whether you finished in four years, are celebrating as a super-senior, or transferred in from another school, the UGL extends a big Illini Congrats to all the graduating seniors this weekend! We truly hope #ClubUGL was a positive part of your time here at Illinois, and we’re sure gonna miss seeing your smiling faces (studying is fun, right?) in our underground hangout!

Alma photo courtesy of illinois.edu/blog

If you are graduating, you don’t have to entirely say goodbye to the library, though! We’ve got great resources for graduates! Check out the guide to Using the Library After Graduation and more info on Services for Alumni.

You can also keep up with the latest in UGL happenings by following us on Twitter, liking us on Facebook, or following our boards on Pinterest. (We know you’re gonna be nostalgic for the all-nighters you pulled here. It’s okay to admit it. We get it.)

If you’re not graduating yet, don’t fret! We have plenty of awesome stuff in store for the summer and next school year, too. Keep in touch, come say hello, and stake out your prime study space for next fall! Remember, we’ll be closed this Saturday and Sunday for graduation weekend, but we’ll be back up and running on Monday, May 13 for Summer I hours.

Thank you, seniors, for helping make our work at the library special and important. After all, the library is here to support YOU! Good luck to all the graduates as you embark on your next adventure. And remember, you’ve always got a friend in the UGL!

No sleep ’til summer

Posted on May 2, 2013 by HJL

Try not to get too stressed as the school year wraps up in the next week. With last-minute group meetings and cram sessions, you may find you need a place away from your dorm or apartment to study. If you find yourself in the unfortunate event of having to pull an all-nighter, the UGL is here for you 24/7 during finals week.

We’re here for you–all night, every night during finals week.

Here are our special hours for finals week:

The UGL will be open continuously from now until Friday, May 10th, when we’ll close at 7 PM.
If you plan on hanging with us all night, read our tips to get the most out of the library services.
The UGL will remain closed the weekend of commencement, May 11-12.

We’ll start our summer hours on Monday, May 13th. So if you’ll be hanging with us in Chambana this summer, be sure to watch our blog, Twitter, and Facebook for hours updates.

Dog Days

Posted on April 29, 2013 by RAL

Hey, #ClubUGL! Therapy dogs are coming back to the library for finals week!

Cuddle up with a book and a pup!

We know how stressful finishing classes can be—especially at the end of the school year. So if you’re feeling a little overwhelmed, need a study break, or just simply love dogs, make sure you stop by to visit.

Sam the Alaskan Malamute and Raven the standard Poodle will be back (Read more about them here!), courtesy of the Champaign-Urbana Canine Connection.

So just where is all this fuzzy, puppy goodness happening? We’ve got three locations this time, to best suit your needs:

Friday, May 3rd: ARC (11am-2pm)

Monday, May 6th: UGL (2pm-5pm)

Tuesday, May 7th: Grainger (2pm-5pm)

Hope to see you next Monday at the UGL—make sure you pick up a custom-made bookmark featuring one of our Dog Stars, too!

Happy studying!

Spotlight on…American Fact Finder

Posted on April 25, 2013 by HJL

In these final frantic weeks of the school year, you may find yourself needing some stats for final projects and papers. If you’re not sure where to get started, we have a lot of resources to help, but if you know you need stats about American people, businesses, industries, or markets, then try American Fact Finder’s Guided Search tool to get exactly what you need.

Screen shot of American Fact Finder homepage
American Fact Finder is hosted by the U.S. Census and is a good source for data about agriculture, education, employment, health, law, etc. Their website features valuable links to other official statistical resources, both domestic and international. Using the Guided Search tool enables you to tell the database exactly what you’re looking for, in an easy, step-by-step format.

To get to American Fact Finder, you simply start at the UGL homepage, and click on “How do I?” in the top right corner:

Showing the How do I? link on the UGL homepage

From there, you’ll look for the heading for “Find Sources” and then click on “Statistics”:

Screen shot showing the link to get to resources for stats

Finally, you’ll see a selection of databases designed for statistics, and you’ll click on “American Fact Finder”:

Screen shot showing the link to access American Fact Finder

Once you’re in the database, you’ll see an option on the left side of your screen for “Guided Search.” Just select that option, and follow the link to get started.

Screen shot of the American Fact Finder homepage

The guided search tool will now walk you through several steps to help you narrow the information you can access. You start with selecting what kind of information you want (like people, industries, housing, or a specific table or dataset). Next you’ll choose topic areas (like age, education, race, etc.), then location (or geography), and on until you can see results that match your criteria. You can add as many topics, geographies, etc., as you like.

Screen shot showing the Guided Search tool

Then the database will give you tables and stats based on your criteria, and you can also easily see what census the information has pulled from, so you know how recent it is. Pretty nifty, huh? This is only one librarian-approved source for statistics. If you find yourself needing other types of stats, check out the UGL’s statistics guide for more great sources of information.

Crowdsource Your Reading

Posted on April 22, 2013 by CN

This does not come close to representing how many books you all posted.

Usually when reading recommendations get posted on our blog, it means a librarian sat down and thought about books for a while (as librarians tend to do) before making a list and posting it for your perusal. It’s fun for us and hopefully for you, too! That’s not how this post got made, however – this week, we thought we’d turn it over to you.

if you visited the UGL in person last week, you may have noticed a whiteboard just inside the doors of the upper level. The whiteboard wanted to know what books had influenced you the most, and as you can see the picture above, lots of you responded! The board stayed up for a few more days after this picture was taken, so even more people wrote down and posted their most influential reads as time went on. Book titles filled up both sides and even started creeping around the edges.

Since you were all so eager to share your recommendations with each other (and showed a lot of variety in your choices) we’ve made today’s readers’ advisory based on the books you posted to the board. If you saw an interesting title on the board, maybe you’ll find it linked below and check it out – and if it’s one of the many we missed, you can look it up in the catalog or ask a librarian to help you find it.

What book has influenced you the most, Club UGL?

Whew! That’s a load of good books right there, and it doesn’t even begin to cover it. If you contributed to the board (and therefore today’s post) thanks for you contributions. If you missed out, feel free to share your recommendations now in the comments, and keep an eye out for future whiteboard questions in the UGL!

Remembering Roger Ebert

Posted on April 18, 2013 by RAL

If there’s one thing we think esteemed alum Roger Ebert might’ve appreciated about the updates to the UGL, it’s the expansive film collection on the lower level. This weekend marks the 15th Annual Ebertfest Film Festival in Champaign, and it’s the first without its namesake, following Ebert’s passing on April 4.

Aside from his renowned writing style and deep love for the movies, Ebert was also dedicated to his hometown of Urbana and his alma mater, the University of Illinois. Check out the moving blog brought to you by our friends at the other end of the tunnel, the University Archives. Not only do they have a great collection of Ebert’s papers and correspondence, they also have interesting info on his life and time as a student at Illinois, including his tenure as editor of the DI.

If you’re looking for more information about this ground-breaking (and oft-controversial) film critic, devotee of the motion picture, and proud U of I journalism student, the library has plenty of his books:

Awake in the Dark: The Best of Roger Ebert, Forty Years of Reviews, Essays, and Interviews

Scorsese By Ebert

I Hated, Hated, Hated This Movie

Life Itself: A Memoir

Roger Ebert’s Four-Star Reviews: 1967-2007

An Illini Century: 100 Years of Campus Life

The Perfect Lond on Walk

A Horrible Experience of Unbearable Length: More Movies that Suck

For other books by Ebert, head to the online catalog. Type Ebert, Roger (the best format when searching for authors) in the search box, and change the drop-down menu from “Keyword” to “Author.” Happy reading and hats off to an admirable man and friend of the University, library and the fields of journalism and film.

Celebrate National Library Week

Posted on April 15, 2013 by HJL

It’s time to show your UGL love, dear readers. This week is National Library Week–a time to highlight the value libraries contribute to their communities. The theme for this year’s week-long library love fest is “Communities matter @ your library.”

First sponsored in 1958, National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and libraries across the country each April. It asks us to take a week out of our crazy-busy year and consider how much libraries contribute to our lives as students and as community members. Here at the UGL, we work hard to offer you the space, materials, and helpful staff you need to be successful as students and in the future.

If you want to bask in the library love this week, there are a lot of things you can do to explore different libraries on campus. Start with our library bucket list. Other things to consider?

Check out “The James Bond Theme: Music to Live, Die, and Love Another Day” Exhibit at the Sousa Archives.
Attend the Savvy Researcher Workshop on using the library after graduation to learn how you can continue to use library services after graduating from this fine institution.
Scope out the Rare Book & Manuscripts Library’s “Casino Royale and Beyond: Sixty Years of Ian Fleming’s Literary Bond” Exhibit where you can see different editions of the first James Bond novel, as well as letters, reviews, photos, and more.

Also consider saying thanks to the library workers you encounter on Tuesday, April 16, which is National Library Workers Day. And on Thursday, April 18, it’s Support Teen Literature Day, so stop in to the Center for Children’s Books or the Education library’s Children & Young Adult Lit Collection.

There are so many ways libraries impact our lives every day, so this week, take some time to say thanks. Let us know your favorite things about #ClubUGL in the comments or share your UGL love with us on Facebook or Twitter (#libraryweek) or visit our Library Love board on Pinterest.

Listful Thinking

Posted on April 11, 2013 by CN

April showers bring not only May flowers, but also May caps, gowns, degrees and graduation ceremonies. Many of you will be leaving us forever soon, and we wish you the best! Before you go, though, you should make sure that you’ve gotten the most out of the library during your stay.

We’ve made a handy library ‘bucket list’ to help you explore all the secret levels and unlock all the achievements in your beloved UIUC library system. Be forewarned – the more things you do on this list, the more you’ll understand how awesome the library is, and you may never want to leave.

Image courtesy of homedepot.com

View the Gutenberg Bible fragments stored in the Rare Book Collection
Watch an entire television series from the UGL Media Collection
Go bird-watching in the Main Library (by which we mean check out their Audubon prints!)
Visit the Center for Children’s Books or the S-Collection, find your favorite children’s book, and be transported back to your childhood
Read an entire comic book series from the UGL’s graphic novel collection
Predict your post-college future with divination books from the Mandeville collection
Try to find a book on your own in the main stacks – look out for ghosts, mole people, and low ceilings!
If the main stacks aren’t creepy enough for you, try the stacks in the Math Library
If the Math stacks are too creepy for you, you can just check out the lovely murals in their rotunda!
Ask QB all your burning questions! If you don’t ask now, when will you ever find out?
Publicly defeat your friends at a game from the gaming collection
Get an international perspective on the news in the Communications Library News Lounge
Take a gander at the Sousa Archive’s current exhibitions (then go home and make Sousa’s favorite spaghetti)
Read the plaque next to the Morrow Plots – that’s the weird corn patch next door to the UGL. That corn is part of why the Undergrad is Underground – learn more about it!
Step outside into the UGL courtyard to enjoy the spring sunshine and read all of the words engraved around the upper wall
There are plenty more interesting things in the other libraries on campus – to round out the list, why don’t you try to visit them all?

If you’ve got a few semesters to go before you graduate, you can of course still do the things on this list – you can just do them at a more leisurely pace! If you enjoy completing this list (or if you think of any important library attractions that we forgot) make sure to tell us about it in the comments, on our Facebook page, or on Twitter. Good luck!

Poetry is Slammin’

Posted on April 8, 2013 by RAL

April is National Poetry Month! Poetry can be a great way to express yourself, and some of the world’s greatest literary works take the form of poems. Celebrate this month of poets, rhythm, meter, metrical patterns, stanzas, alliteration, diction and form by learning about one of the library’s many poetry resources.

Online Resources

MLA International Bibliography
This database is your first stop for literary criticism and analysis of novels, short stories, poems, etc.
Literature Resource Center
This database is a bio-bibliographical guide to writers in fiction, general nonfiction, poetry, journalism, drama, motion pictures, television, and other fields. It’s searchable by name, title of work, subject/genre, nationality, date and place of birth, honors, awards and more.
Contemporary American Ethnic Poets: Lives, Works, Sources
This one-stop guide to 75 contemporary American poets from 12 different ethnicities includes biographical sketches, thematic discussions, and more.
Greenwood Companion to Shakespeare Vol. 4: The Romances & Poetry
This nifty tool has prose interpretations of Shakespeare’s sonnets!
Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Poets & Poetry
Separated into 5 volumes, this handy encyclopedia lists both author and poem topics alphabetically, making it easy to locate info on a specific writer, or find sweet poetry about everything from the Black Arts Movement to Visual Poetry.
Thematic Guide to British Poetry
This guide offers interpretations of 415 poems, representing the work of over 110 poets spanning seven centuries of British poetry.
Poetry Tool
Online archive of full text poetry with a robust search engine. It also includes numerous articles, podcasts, and audio on poets and poetry, brought to you by the Poetry Foundation.

Books & More
You can also search the library catalog by poem title, author or genre for books of poetry and books about poetry and poets. If you’re looking for some recommendations, check out our Poetry! Pinterest Board. And if you’re really feeling inspired, sign up to receive a Poem-A-Day via email, courtesy of Poets.org.

Still not finding that perfect poetry source? Ask a Librarian for help, and poetic justice shall surely be yours!

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