scholarly journals Strategic Reinvestments of Journal Packages at the Pennsylvania State University

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mihoko Hosoi

In the face of budget challenges, organizational strategy changes, and the new open access (OA) policy, the Pennsylvania State University Libraries (PSUL) are reevaluating negotiations and collections of ‘big deal’ journal packages. While a growing number of libraries are considering cancelling subscriptions to ‘big deals’, PSUL has been taking a careful approach in containing cost and making sure that faculty and students have access to resources that they need. Current efforts include: renegotiating ‘big deals’; cancelling low value titles in title-by-title agreements; obtaining single agreements for the entire Penn State; promoting green OA for future subscription negotiation purposes; and renegotiating OA related licensing terms. To achieve greater efficiency of acquisitions workflows and increase university-wide purchasing power, reallocation of the collection budget will be discussed in the near future. Auto deposit of accepted manuscripts from any Penn State author into ScholarSphere, Penn State’s institutional repository, as well as exploration of other OA models are also under consideration.

2018 ◽  
Vol 79 (2) ◽  
pp. 89
Author(s):  
Karla M. Schmit ◽  
Bernadette A. Lear

Two years ago, we reported the beginnings of a collaboration between Education librarians at two locations within Pennsylvania State University Libraries (PSUL): the Education Library at University Park and the Penn State Harrisburg Library. We described our methods of cooperative purchasing of PreK–12 textbooks and instructional materials, which represented substantial costs and challenges to both locations.2 Since then, we have explored additional ways of sharing collection development tasks, while retaining much of the autonomy that librarians within PSUL prize. This article focuses on our efforts with our juvenile literature collections.


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-12
Author(s):  
Ann MacKay Snowman

When Pennsylvania State University Libraries’ administration invited library staff to take leadership in planning an in-service day, what resulted was a rich training experience for both participants and planners, one that has become institutionalized. Now approaching its twelfth year, University Libraries’ Discovery Day continues to grow and develop. This author recounts the genesis and growth of the annual event and articulates the valuable outcomes of staff training and development.


2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-34
Author(s):  
Kevin McDonough

Developed by Coherent Digital, Mindscape Commons provides a platform for VR content relating to the health sciences, counseling, psychology, and social work. Content is either commercial, Open Access, research based, or exclusively developed by Coherent Digital. The VR experiences are available as 180/360 videos or animations, visible within a browser screen, through dedicated head mounted displays (HMD) from Oculus, and smartphones in conjunction with Google Cardboard. Experiences can be searched, browsed, and accessed from Mindscape Commons’ website and there are abundant filters to refine your results. The most valuable content is related to counseling simulations and was developed by Coherent Digital in conjunction with Mercer University and Penn State University. Being able to view content within HMDs is somewhat tricky, but the feeling of immersion and realism is greater. Pricing is reasonable considering the marketplace for educational VR content, and the number of experiences is expected to grow.


MRS Bulletin ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 17 (9) ◽  
pp. 22-26
Author(s):  
Rustum Roy

Robert Sproull, the director of AREA (Advanced Research Projects Agency) in the Pentagon, recorded that Pennsylvania State University and Carnegie Institute of Technology first made proposals in 1957 for “interdisciplinary block funding” in what would essentially become “materials” research. But it was the industrial push (by W.O. Baker of AT&T Bell Laboratories and C.G. Suits of General Electric) that helped ARPA start the funding of 12 interdisciplinary materials research laboratories (IDMRLs) between 1960 and 1963. Pennsylvania State University was added in 1963 as a special modest grant limited to materials preparation (synthesis and processing). NASA and the Atomic Energy Commission added six more within two years. The first interdisciplinary degree program in “materials” (then called solid-state technology), administered directly by a graduate school committee drawn from 10 departments, was started under my chairmanship, at Penn State in 1959-60. Probably the first departmental degree program in which a metallurgy department expanded its scope (and changed its name) to include other materials was started at nearly the same time at North western University by Prof. M.E. Fine. It is noteworthy that at least in these two cases the intellectual and curricular argument for integration of degree work preceded the research grants and organization. These two separate patterns have both now permeated the entire national system, and we should clearly distinguish between them. By 1969 the first national colloquy on materials, held at Penn State and published under the title Materials Science and Engineering in the U.S., took an evaluative look at materials education.


Author(s):  
Katie Grantham ◽  
Gu¨l Okudan ◽  
Timothy W. Simpson ◽  
Omar Ashour

Situation cognition theory describes the context of a learning activity’s effect on learner’s cognition. In this paper, we use situated cognition theory to examine the effect of product dissection on product redesign activities. Two research questions were addressed: 1) Does situated cognition, in the form of product dissection, improve product functionality during redesign exercise?, and 2) Does situation cognition, again in the form of product dissection, affect the creativity of product redesigns? In this study, three sections of first year students in two different locations — The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State) and Missouri University of Science and Technology (S&T) — performed product redesign using either an electric toothbrush or a coffee maker. The redesigned products have been analyzed with respect to both depth (detail level) and creativity.


2019 ◽  
Vol 80 (2) ◽  
pp. 92
Author(s):  
Alexandria Chisholm ◽  
Brett Spencer

Penn State-Berks is one of 24 commonwealth campuses in the Pennsylvania State University (PSU) system. With around 2,800 students, it is a small, tight knit community, yet remains one of the largest campuses outside of University Park.While the campus is spacious and beautiful, one feature it lacks is an adequate student center, which makes the Thun Library the heart of the campus. Not only does the library provide traditional and valued services, such as access to textbooks on reserve, computer and software access, and research assistance, it is also a location where students gather to study, hang out between classes, and conduct group work. With a large commuter population, the library offers vital spaces for those without dorm rooms to complete their work. In addition, several other departments are also housed within the building, including the Center for Teaching and Learning along with the information technology (IT) help desk.


2005 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 46-47
Author(s):  
Thomas F. Kelly ◽  
Allan J. Melmed

October 2005 marks 50 years since the first images achieving atomic resolution were obtained by Erwin Miiller and Kanwar Bahadur at the Pennsylvania State University using field ion microscopy. An image from that seminal work is shown in Figure 1. Two separate meetings were held this year to commemorate this important event in the history of microscopy; the 50th Anniversary of Atomic Resolution Microscopy, held June 15-17, 2005 at Penn State and the Golden Anniversary of Atomic Resolution Imaging, a symposium at Microscopy and Microanalysis 2005 in Honolulu held July 31 to August 4, 2005. These celebrations were timed to coincide also with the World Year of Physics 2005 http://www. wyp2005.org/.


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