Ask Us for Library help
Database Help dbhelp@umass.libanswers.com
IT Help Desk for computer help; phone 413-545-9400, email it@umass.edu, or chat with a consultant
The Libraries' Information Literacy Modules are a set of online videos, text tutorials, and quizzes covering topics relating to information literacy. UMass Amherst Libraries are making available these standalone resources to Faculty to use independently in any of your classes. You can link this content wherever you like, and use as much or as little of this content with your students.
Open Educational Resources (OER) are free, openly licensed, educational materials such as textbooks, videos, podcasts, primary source materials, syllabi, etc. that can be used for teaching in place of traditional high-cost course materials.
Search these Open Educational Resources repositories :
https://oer.deepwebaccess.com/oer/desktop/en/search.html
https://oasis.geneseo.edu/
https://openstax.org/
Open education virtual labs and simulations:
https://libguides.mines.edu/oer/simulationslabs
https://opentextbc.ca/virtualscienceresources/
https://www.doitpoms.ac.uk/
Each UMass patron has a free subscription to the New York Times online.
To sign up and access, follow these instructions:
https://guides.library.umass.edu/nytimes
Finding and accessing newspaper articles and stores can be tricky.
Use this guide made to help with the searching by state, city, decade, or historical event.
Or search by Newspaper subscription.
Press Reader provides access to a wide selection of magazines and newspapers.
ProCon.org: https://www.procon.org/about-us/
Sometimes you need to create a citation on the fly, while other times, your writing will be more complicated and involve citing several items and keeping track of sources. For this type of work, use a citation manager.
To decide which citation manager to use: https://guides.library.umass.edu/CitationManagers
The Libraries offers workshops on the different citation managers: https://www.library.umass.edu/events
Zotero - a tool to organize your research citations, papers, and ideas: https://www.zotero.org/
CREATE AN ACCOUNT: https://www.zotero.org/user/register
Create an account, download the tool, and add the Zotero connector to access full functionality. The web version will sync with the downloaded desktop version. The web version alone does work but will require some workarounds (add a citation using the DOI) and does not offer much storage for paper pdfs.
To create a compelling story, you might want to investigate these three types of sources:
When starting a research project, it is sometimes helpful to search popular magazines to scaffold information and learn the level of information communicated to a public audience.
The database Academic Search Premier is the ONLY database that will let you search specifically for magazine and trade publications.
Target your database search by combining these tools with your strategic keywords.
Using quotes "_____" keeps words together as a phrase. Example: "Climate Change"
Using parentheses (_____) collects like terms. Example: (Sea or Ocean or Coast)
Using an asterisk * at end of of a word returns all the various word endings. Example: Flood* for Flood, Flooded, Flooding
Research databases help you find journal articles and many other types of publications. The best database to use is determined by your research topic. Consult Madeleine or Paulina for help!
Off-campus, log in with your UMass Amherst NetID
The databases listed are in ALPHABETICAL order, not in order of importance to your topic.
The Congressional Research Service (CRS) is the non-partisan public policy research arm of the United States Congress.
CRS experts prepare reports to assist members of Congress throughout the legislative process providing background information and data on public policy issues.
