BY MONTE MAXWELL

WVU Libraries has begun one of the final stages in the completion of the Downtown Library Complex.

During the next few weeks, the West Virginia and Regional History Collection, along with 47,000 volumes from the general collection, and libraries faculty and staff will relocate to the renovated Charles C. Wise, Jr. Library.

The process will bring permanently improve services that students and faculty receive, but may cause some temporary inconveniences, officials explained.

At times during the move, some materials may not be immediately available. However, Libraries Dean Frances O’Brien assures users that Downtown Campus Library staff will work diligently to minimize inconveniences.

This move is the second in 12 months for WVU Libraries. Last fall,
workers transported books, periodicals, microfilm, maps, and staff
offices from Wise, the Physical Science Library in Clark Hall and the Maps Library in White Hall to the new Downtown Campus Library.

“Our staff worked very hard to meet patrons’ needs while the collections were in transition,” Dean O’Brien said. “We received very few complaints. I think our users know we’ll always do our best to get them the materials they need.”

Dean O’Brien anticipates another relatively smooth transition this time.

Crews began moving the West Virginia and Regional History
Collection this week, and WVRHC Director John Cuthbert expects to open the doors of the new space on the sixth floor of Wise during the week of Nov. 18 subject to the approval of the fire marshal. The collection and microfilm will be closed during the process.

Access to the archives and manuscripts will be available by appointment through Nov. 23. Portions of the general collection
will be moved during the Thanksgiving break. To assist the
move, the Downtown Campus Library will be closed Nov. 27-30.

The following will be relocated: Appalachian Collection; African
Collection; ORLA Collection; theses and dissertations; National Union Catalog, pre-56 imprints; and books with call numbers beginning with PR and PS.

For more information, contact Carroll Wilkinson, head of access
services, 293-4040 ext. 4011, or Cuthbert, 293-3536.

BY MONTE MAXWELL
WVU LIBRARIES

WVU Libraries has made research a little easier for psychology faculty and students with the addition of PsycARTICLES, an online database of 43 journals from the field.

“It’s the difference between night and day,” psychology professor Stan Cohen said. “The time savings alone will be incredible.”

Before, finding a needed article in one of these journals required going to the Downtown Campus Library, finding and retrieving the journal from the stacks, photocopying the article and repeating the process for each desired article. And then the actual work could begin.

Now, the task simply requires finding a computer with Internet access and clicking a few keys. Students and faculty can access the database, PsycARTICLES, from the WVU Libraries homepage,
http://www.libraries.wvu.edu. It joins WVU Libraries’ collection of more than 10,000 electronic journals.

Cohen expects the online access to benefit psychology students who are often asked to do brief abstracts of journal articles. Rather than a few hundred students racing into the library to grab the same journals, they can read them online from home.

Psychology professor Barry Edelstein finds the ability to do research from his office or home appealing. “You can’t sit in the library all the time and write a manuscript,” Edelstein said.

Both educators see advantages just in the increased access to quality sources. For faculty who subscribe to journals included in the database, the access equals financial savings. PsycARTICLES is a database of full-text articles from journals published by the American Psychological Association, the APA Educational Publishing Foundation, the Canadian Psychological Association, and Hogrefe & Huber. The database includes all material from the print journals from 1988 to the present with the exception of ads and editorial board lists.