Announcements

OhioLINK announces the State Library of Ohio has awarded American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) grant funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) for the purchase of a collection of unlimited- and perpetual-access Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) e-books. OhioLINK’s central coordination of the selection and implementation will make these e-books accessible to libraries that otherwise would not have the financial, staffing, or technical resources to acquire such a collection. The collection will be available for Spring 2022.

The past few years of national headlines and social justice demonstrations have focused collection development librarians' attention on the need for better representation of diverse communities and perspectives in library collections....

Please place requests for print material with plenty of time to allow for delivery. If you have hard deadlines that require the use of specific course or research materials, please contact your local institution's librarians to request their assistance in finding alternate sources for your needed materials.

The OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD) Center has been updated with a major release that improves speed, reliability, security, and digital accessibility, and adds advanced search functions to help visitors easily find Ohio’s student research and scholarship. The ETD Center showcases more than 100,000 downloadable theses and dissertations from Ohio’s graduating scholars with no paywall or subscription, and has had more than 85 million views from 234 countries.

As part of the OhioLINK Membership Summit, OhioLINK hosted the “DEI in LIS” webinar panel, moderated by Otterbein University’s Library Director Tiffany Lipstreu. The webinar panelists discussed diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts within Ohio’s library and information science (LIS) sector and educated attendees about OhioLINK’s Luminaries Program.

Amy Pawlowski, executive director of OhioLINK, kicked off the talk by discussing OhioLINK’s DEI initiative, which aims to identify and encourage diverse candidates for Ohio’s libraries and library-related industries, while also supporting efforts towards greater diversity, equity, and inclusion at the library level. A major component of this initiative is the newly dubbed OhioLINK Luminaries Program, which gives undergraduate college students from under-represented populations an...

OhioLINK eTutoring has launched a new platform that offers college students convenient access to tutors who can provide assistance with a wide variety of academic subjects.

The service, which is free to undergraduate students enrolled in 20 participating colleges and universities in the state of Ohio, is supported by the Ohio Department of Higher Education. It has served more than 30,000 college students since 2010.

OhioLINK eTutoring has now partnered with TutorOcean, a global tutoring marketplace and supplemental learning platform, to provide expanded services and features.

“The new platform is user-friendly and offers a lot of options for the students,” said Karen Boyd, former coordinator of OhioLINK eTutoring.

Students can book one-on-one...

As part of the ongoing OhioLINK Membership Summit, OhioLINK recently participated in the “Communicating Your Library’s Value” webinar panel, moderated by The University of Akron. This topic is a particularly important one for libraries as they navigate ongoing pandemic-related budget challenges and the continuing evolution of the library’s role in the higher education ecosystem.

Five panelists discussed their strategies for promoting their library’s value and impact and highlighted success stories, including identifying and working with stakeholders, the role of storytelling, utilizing usage data, the power of comparative data, and demonstrating value through strategic planning.

Sean Kennedy, collections and content strategies librarian at the University of Akron, began the talk by discussing the common...

As part of its third annual OhioLINK Membership Summit, OhioLINK recently hosted the “What COVID-19 Taught Us About Affordable Course Materials” panel, which discussed lessons learned about using affordable course materials in the rapid transition to online learning during the pandemic.

Following a brief introduction from Anna Bendo, OhioLINK’s Director of Affordable Learning, panelists were each given time to discuss their experience working on affordable learning projects that were in part spurred on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Afterwards, speakers were asked several questions regarding how the pandemic affected their work, whether faculty and staff at their institutions became more agreeable to utilizing Open Educational Resources (OER) materials, and...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – After an eventful year during which the organization changed leadership and assisted its member libraries as they dealt with unprecedented COVID-19 changes, OhioLINK announces a reorganization that promotes three long-time staff to leadership. Judy Cobb, Joanna Voss, and Theda Schwing will move into newly created Associate Director roles.

“Judy, Joanna, and Theda stepped up to guide OhioLINK and its member libraries through pandemic-created challenges with their technical expertise, strategic thinking, and empathy,” said OhioLINK Executive Director Amy Pawlowski, who assumed directorship in February after serving as Deputy Director since 2013. “I’m confident in their capacity...

OhioLINK, Ohio's academic library consortium, has added inclusive, alternative subject headings to MARC records for shared electronic resources that include the word alien as a term to mean non-citizens. The additions addressed proposed, but not yet implemented, changes for twelve Library of Congress (LC) subject headings. These additional subject headings display as keywords and are searchable in the OhioLINK Central Catalog.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – OhioLINK, Ohio’s statewide academic library consortium, has partnered with BiblioBoard to implement a major update to its electronic book platform. Released December 30th, the modernized Electronic Book Center (EBC) provides an improved user experience, including digital accessibility, and mobile compatibility. BiblioBoard technology supports user-friendly browsing, searching, list-making, note-taking, bookmarking, online reading, and downloading of e-books and e-chapters on a variety of devices. The EBC’s 180,000 e-books can be accessed via any web connection to support scholarly research, and also can be used by faculty as no-cost textbooks to reduce the financial burden of attending college. Students and faculty downloaded...