Category Archives: Online Resources

New Resources – NewsBank and RAND State Statistics

CPCC Libraries now has access to two new resources: RAND State Statistics and NewsBank.

RAND State Statistics

Need to find out if crimes are on the rise or decline in a specific state or county?  Interested in seeing what programs your tax money is spent on in your hometown?  Want to know about the employment outlook for your career field?  All of these questions and more can be answered by the RAND State Statistics database.  RAND State Statistics contains nearly 80 databases that cover a wide range of categories: business and economics, community, education, energy and environment, government finance, health and population

NewsBank

NewsBank provides access to thousands of newspapers, both nationally and worldwide.  In particular, it provides access to several local newspapers: The Charlotte Observer, The Charlotte Post and The Mecklenburg Times. NewsBank is a perfect source for conducting research on local or state issues.

These resources may be accessed by clicking the highlighted links above or from the Research Databases section of the library website.

International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Ever wanted to learn to talk like a pirate?  Well, you’re in luck!  September 19 is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.  And to celebrate the day the way it was meant to be celebrated, Mango Languages offers a language course in Pirate!

Follow these five easy steps to get started speaking Pirate:

  • Go to Mango Languages (if you’re off-campus, you will need to log-in with your CPCC Login at this point)
  • Create an account or simply log-in, if you already have one. (This account is different from your CPCC Login.)
  • After logging in, select Courses from the menu.
  • Choose Pirate from the menu listing of languages.
  • Click Launch to begin learning Pirate!

(And remember, once International Talk Like a Pirate Day is over, you can still use Mango Languages to learn a new language, such as French or Spanish.)

Also, in order to celebrate the day in style, why not check out some of the pirate-related booty that the library has to offer?

Piracy: The Complete History

Under the Black Flag: The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates

Pirates of the Caribbean Movies

Treasure Island

Jean Laffite: Prince of Pirates

The Pirates of Colonial North Carolina

Blackbeard and Other Pirates of the Atlantic Coast

And did you know that you can change your Facebook page to read in Pirate?

To turn your Facebook feed into Pirate, click on “Account Settings” in the upper right navigation bar, then click on “Languages > Edit,” and scroll down to “English (Pirate) – and your Facebook page is translated into Pirate!

Finally, Mango Pirate is also available to library patrons via the Mango Mobile Library Edition smartphone apps.

 

 

New Look and New Resources!

The library’s homepage has a new look.  Swing by http://www.cpcc.edu/library to check it out!  And while you’re there, have a look at a few of our newest resources:

Find It! at CPCC Libraries

Find It! at CPCC Libraries is a new library discovery tool that enables you to search and find materials in the library catalog and many of the databases at the same time. Find It! at CPCC Libraries is powered by EBSCO Discovery Service.

EasyBib

EasyBib is an intuitive information literacy platform that provides citation, note taking, and research tools that are easy-to-use and educational. EasyBib is not only accurate, fast, and comprehensive, but helps educators teach and students learn how to become effective and organized researchers.  CPCC Libraries’ premium subscription provides access to works cited and bibliography formatting for MLA, APA and Chicago/Turabian citation styles.

Ferguson’s Career Guidance Center

Ferguson’s Career Guidance Center features authori­tative, comprehensive content on careers and jobs.  Ferguson’s is broken down into three main sections: Job and Industry Profiles, Job-Hunting and Workplace Skills, and Career and Industry Resources.   It also includes profiles of over 4,000 undergraduate schools, as well as a career interest assessment.

Please feel free to contact Doug Short with any questions or feedback about these resources.

Resource of the Month – Small Business Reference Center

Interested in starting your own business?  Our featured resource of the month for May, Small Business Reference Center, may be able to help you!  This recent addition to NC Live contains e-books of the popular NOLO series that covers a wide range of small business topics, including writing a business plan, how to start a business and marketing for small businesses.  Additionally, this resource contains business related videos.  It is an ideal resource to assist you with many small business questions that you may have.

Small Business Reference Center may be accessed here or from the Research Databases section of the library website.

Resource Trial : Easy Bib

Struggling with end of the semester citations?  The library is here to help!  We are trialing a new service called EasyBib.  The trial ends May 12. 

So what can EasyBib do?

  •  Easily create a bibliography in MLA and APA
  • Export works cited to Word or Googledocs fully formatted
  • Create in-text citations and tag and sort citations
  • Cite/autocite 58 source types (books, articles, YouTube videos, articles from a database, newspapers, etc.)
  • Help find more reliable web sources for your research
  • Help you analyze your sources to determine which ones are credible and which ones aren’t
And EasyBib does a lot more than that…click here to see a brief slide show about its many features.

EasyBib even has a mobile app, available for both  iPhone and Android.

We would love to hear what you think about EasyBib.  Please send any feedback to Erin Payton at  erin.payton@cpcc.edu .  Your comments will help the library determine whether or not to make this a permanent resource.

Resource of the Month: Legal Information Reference Center

Interested in writing a living will?  Have questions about repairing your credit score?  Need information about divorce and custody?  CPCC Libraries’ Resource of the Month can help you will all of these things!

Our featured resource of the month for April is Legal Information Reference Center.  This recent addition to NC Live contains e-books of the popular NOLO Law series that covers a wide range of legal topics, including buying & selling a house, wills & estates, divorce & custody and getting a green card.  You may access the books either by browsing through categories or by keyword searching.  It is an ideal resource to assist you with many legal questions that you may have.

Legal Information Reference Center may be accessed here or from the Research Databases section of the library website.

Database Trial: History Study Center

CPCC students and faculty have trial access to History Study Center through April 30th. The library is considering purchasing this resource. Take a few moments to try it out and let us know what you think. Send any feed back to Kimberley Balcos (kimberley.balcos@cpcc.edu).

From the publisher:

History Study Center is an online resource providing a vast collection of primary and secondary sources for the study of history. It is suitable for a wide range of people, from high school students looking for quick and reliable facts on a historical topic, to researchers examining hard-to-find primary source texts.

History Study Center covers global history from ancient times to the present day. Contents include reference books, essays, journal articles, historical newspaper and magazine articles, maps, rare books, government documents, transcripts of historical speeches, images and video clips. Study Units offer editorially selected material on over 500 historical topics.

History Study Center provides over 40,000 documents and articles, with over 50 reference works, 3,000 images and links to 2,000 Web sites.

EBSCOHost Database Outage

Our database vendor EBSCO is having system-wide difficulties today. All EBSCO databases, which include popular databases such as Academic Source Complete, Associates Programs Source Plus and EBSCO ebooks, will be unavailable while they resolve the issue. Access to these databases will hopefully be restored by the end of the day. Other databases, such as Opposing Viewpoints, Credo Reference and many others are still available for research.

Films on Demand…Now with TEDTalks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you have not explored the videos in our online resource, Films on Demand, now is the time to take a tour.  This database has recently added more than 200 new TEDTalks videos, with hundreds more to be added by the end of the year.  These films bring together some of the most fascinating and inspiring voices in areas ranging from technology, science, and global issues to entertainment, design, and business.  Just go to the library’s Research Databases page, and click on Films on Demand to access the database.  Your CPCC login will allow you to view the films, but if you setup your own User Account on the database, you will be able to create and share customized playlists, save your favorite videos for quick access, and set your default preferences.  Give it a try!

Resource of the Month – eBook Collection from EBSCOHost

Our featured resource of the month for March is the eBook Collection from EBSCOHost.  Formerly NetLibrary, this database offers access to a wide selection of full-text ebooks.  Books in this database cover a wide range of categories, from study aids & language learning to health & medicine.

The eBook Collection from EBSCOHost may be accessed here or from the Research Databases section of the library website.