It's not just February, it’s Hubruary at the library! This whole month is a shout-out to the Microsoft Surface Hubs available for you at Buhl. If you haven’t met the Hubs yet, now is a great time!
What they are
Surface Hubs are the large screens in the Huddle Rooms and on wheels in the Learning Commons. They offer a large-screen display but are also interactive, so they can be used as a digital whiteboard, meeting platform, collaboration tool, and more.
What you can do
How to access (3 options!)
How you can learn more
The research
Did you know Buhl Librarians conducted a research study on student use of the Surface Hubs last spring, gathering input from students and faculty? The results have just been published:
Marks, Kimberly, and Gretchen Maxeiner. "Exploring Student Use of Microsoft’s Surface Hubs in an Academic Library." Computers in Libraries, vol. 44, no. 1, 2024. pp. 8-12.
What are Course Reserves?
Course reserves are readings for your class that your instructor has made available through the library. They may be required readings or just supplemental suggestions, but if you see them listed on your new syllabus, here's what you'll need to know.
There are two types of reserves, and you will locate and access them differently. You may have to look both places to find your reserve if your syllabus doesn't specify the type.
Electronic reserves
These are online articles or other digital content that can be accessed at any time from your laptop. You do NOT need to come to the library to get an electronic reserve. You can access them from the library's home page from the Course Reserves link.
Print reserves
These are physical items such as books, article photocopies, and DVDs that must be checked out and used within Buhl Library. You can check out one at a time, typically for 2 hours, and you can photocopy or scan materials to take with you. To find out if your title or citation is on print reserve, you can use the Academic Reserves feature in the library catalog.
Once you know that your item is on Print Reserve, you can request it at the library check-out desk.
For more information on course reserves, check out our Course Reserves Guide.
If your studies fall in the areas of communication, mass media, and related fields including business, this is a database to know! Communication & Mass Media Complete (CMMC) provides full-text coverage for over 450 journals plus indexing and abstracts for hundreds more. These cover the breadth of the field, and many of the major journals have coverage dating back to their first issue. All entries here can also be retrieved via Discovery, but working directly in CMMC allows you to take advantage of custom features:
We give this database an especial shout-out to business students for its strong coverage on organizational communication. Give it a try!
“Here’s what science can tell you: Good relationships keep us happier, healthier, and help us live longer.
This is true across the lifespan, and across cultures and contexts, which means it is almost certainly true for you, and for nearly every human being who has ever lived.”
from Waldinger, Robert, and Marc Schulz. The Good Life: Lessons from the World’s Longest Scientific Study of Happiness. Simon & Schuster, 2023. p. 278. Buhl Library BF575.H27 W35 2023
I Love My Librarian Competition Update
In September the library ran a social media campaign rallying support for our nomination of librarian Kim Marks for the national I Love My Librarian award. Unfortunately, Kim did not win, but it was wonderful to see so many votes of support and testimonials from college faculty, staff, students, alumni, and even Kim’s neighbors! Thank you for sharing all of the positive ways just one of our library staff has helped with your research, answered questions, instructed classes, and supported initiatives all over campus.
Here are a few comments:
"Kim is always so helpful! Whenever I have a question, no matter how dumb I might feel asking it, she always answers with grace and enthusiasm. It is a pleasure to have her at the college." – Current student
"Kim is very knowledgeable! You can tell she truly wants to help you succeed, and she is willing to dig into a topic and look at it in unique ways that inspire innovation." – Former student
Miss the campaign? Start following the library on Instagram and Facebook!
This month's poll!
“I am able to collaborate effectively with other mechanical engineers to complete projects.” – A junior in Mechanical Engineering
"The digital whiteboard is just convenient and satisfying to use!” – A senior in History
"It was nice to use it as an external monitor so everyone in the room could see my screen.” – A senior in Marketing/Business Analysis.
I’m a visual learner so having extra space to write out thoughts is great.” – A junior in English
"Oh man. If the history majors knew about some of these features, they would not let anyone else use them!” – A senior in History
Enjoy a wide range of pen types, tips, and colors to choose from. There is even a glitter pen!
Forget about messy pens that run dry and having to clean the boards when you finish. Just end the session!
Use the lasso tool to easily select everything in an area. You can then drag sections around, duplicate it, or delete it all. A Grover favorite!
Use two fingers to "pinch" the screen to shrink or resize the content to give yourself more room.
Related to the pinch, your two fingers can also drag the whole screen to the side, opening up fresh whitespace for your work. Digital whiteboard = Infinite space!
Use the ruler feature to easily draw in straight lines. You can't go astray!
Sign in to your account (if you aren't already) in order to save your whiteboard. You can review it or continue working on it later, from a Surface Hub or on your own device.
Last year's most-used print title was The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. This 4-volume set is so popular that we keep 2 copies in the Reference Room. Its lifetime checkouts number over 1,500!
You know where to go for help! Librarians and student workers answered thousands of your questions last year. 93% of those were in-person questions, so thanks for coming into the library! The top time for questions is between 1 and 3 pm.
The library provides access to many historic newspapers and also a few current ones. The most read of all is the Wall Street Journal. Not sure how to access? Click here for help!
Grovers love the Huddle Rooms for group work and for using the Surface Hubs. Our data suggests they are in use 72% of the library's open hours, but you can reserve these in advance, and the best availability is often in the morning.
Discovery can do it all! You made over 110,000 searches in this tool last year, finding the resources you needed across our databases, eBooks, and physical library collections.
Chick-fil-A isn't the only place with "carry out". You borrowed over 24,000 books and DVDs from the libraries last year. And-- pat yourself on the back for this-- over 90% of those were returned on time.
It's Nature! You read over a thousand articles from this top scientific journal, which is published weekly and has been available since 1869.
Did you know that library staff moved almost every book in the stacks in summer 2023 to take advantage of some new shelving and to better space out the collection for growth? That's over 121,000 volumes!
The most active course reserve in 2023 was Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat. The reserve copies of this best seller were checked out over a hundred times. Way to go, Prof. Butler's students!
Your most-used database in 2023 was JSTOR. No surprise there! This repeat champ offers historic coverage of almost all subject areas in the form of journal articles, books and primary sources. You downloaded over 42,000 items!
Therapy Dogs in the Library
Who was that bringing comfort and joy to GCC students on Study Day? The therapy dogs! Everyone loved visiting with the pups, and students used a fun interactive chart to track the impact on their finals-time stress levels, marking a "before" and "after". According to the chart, the doggies were, well, downright therapeutic!
Study Day therapy dog visits are a Buhl Library tradition. Follow us on social media to get announcements on the next visit!
What's New?
Here is a sampling of new resources in Buhl Library. Be sure to also check out the new book display in the library lobby.
Hover over a book's title to view a summary.
God-Optional Religion in Twentieth-Century America : Quakers, Unitarians, reconstructionist Jews, and the crisis over theism by 
Ethel Rosenberg : an American tragedy by 
The Map of Wilderland : ecocritical reflections on Tolkien's myth of wilderness by 
The Phoenix Economy : work, life, and money in the new not normal by 
The Elements : a visual history of their discovery by 
Christian Philosophy As a Way of Life : an invitation to wonder by 
The Presidency of Donald J. Trump : a first historical assessment by 
The Sunday Paper : a media history by 
The Deep Ocean : life in the abyss by 
The Persistence of Realism in Modernist Fiction by 
The Ukrainian-Russian Borderland : History Versus Geography by 
Tomorrow's High School : Creating Student Pathways for Both College and Career by 
The London Revolution 1640-1643 : Class Struggles in 17th Century England by 
Beyond Sputnik and the Space Race : The Origins of Global Satellite Communications by 
The Cambridge Companion to the Twentieth-Century American Novel and Politics by 
Music As Mao's Weapon : Remembering the Cultural Revolution by 
Comic Book Women : Characters, Creators, and Culture in the Golden Age by 
The Visionaries : Arendt, Beauvoir, Rand, Weil, and the power of philosophy in dark times by 
How Plato Writes : perspectives and problems by 
A History of Nihilism in the Nineteenth Century by 
Living in Time : the philosophy of Henri Bergson by 
Ancient Women Philosophers : recovered ideas and new perspectives by 
Modern Moral Philosophy : from Grotius to Kant by 
Three Encounters : Heidegger, Arendt, Derrida by 
Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit : a guide by 
An Introduction to the Philosophy of Spinoza by 
Wittgenstein on Religious Belief by
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Contact Us
Email: refdesk@gcc.edu | Phone: 724-264-4729 | Website: hbl.gcc.edu
