SUNY Empire Library News & Alerts

New Library Resources & Services for Spring '24!

Your librarians have been busy getting ready for Spring term by adding new services, updating some existing services, and adding new resources to the library.

First, a reminder to check the library's Textbooks & Course Reserves link to see if we have either for your Spring courses. You can find this in the left column of the library home page under Search Tools whenever you need to check.

Ahead of the Fall term, we added a site license for The Chronicle of Higher Education. For Spring, we added a site license to The New York Times Academic Pass. Both site licenses give our faculty, staff and students access to these publications' web content in addition to our existing database subscription content. Visit the FAQs for The Chronicle of Higher Education and The New York Times site licenses for details on how to register for access. And, as always, you may access our database subscription content for both by searching for them by title at the E-Journals A-Z link on the left column of the library home page, under Search Tools.

Also in the Fall, we piloted a new reference service, Howie, the Library Chatbot on many of the library's web pages. Now that the pilot period is over, you will also find Howie on the library home page. Howie is designed to answer our most commonly-asked questions any time there is no SUNY Empire librarian available to chat with you. Don't worry though, if you prefer to chat with a live librarian from the AskUs 24/7 cooperative of academic librarians instead of Howie, you can select that option--as well as an option to submit a ticket directly to the SUNY Empire librarians--within Howie's menu. And you can always call the library at 800-847-3000 ext. 2222, if that is easier for you.

If you find yourself struggling with a more complex library question than is typical for a library reference interaction, you may be interested in our newest library reference service: Library Consultations. These scheduled, 30-minute consultations via Microsoft Teams are a good idea any time you:
 

• have already worked with a librarian via chat, phone or email, and still haven't found what you need
• are doing intensive research for a literature review, thesis or dissertation
• are experiencing issues with library technology* that aren't easily resolved via chat, phone or email
• are a faculty member interested in integrating library resources into a course, or in need of research guidance for your scholarly endeavors

Lastly, we want to hear from you! In the coming weeks, we will be integrating a new survey tool into some of our reference services like chat and email. Fear not, these will take less than a minute of your valuable time. Each survey will ask you only one question and to rate the interaction on a scale. And you will only see these surveys every so often as opposed to every time you chat with us. We thank you in advance for letting us know how we are doing and what other services and resources you want from the SUNY Empire library.

Have a great Spring term!