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Information and Reference Desk: Primo

For students and staff of the information/reference desk

General Searching & Scopes

General Tips:

When looking for a specific book or material: 

  • Use the title or ISBN (found online or from the WOU bookstore).
  • If a professor is using a "custom" textbook from the WOU Bookstore it's unlikely that you'll find a copy in the catalog unless the professor puts one on course reserve.

When doing broader searches:

  • Start small! Only use a couple keywords to describe what's being looked for.
  • Avoid using whole sentences or entire phrases (the catalog isn't Google!)
  • Always SHOW and TELL the patron what you're doing so that they can replicate it on their own in the future.
  • Call a librarian if you're having a hard time finding materials! We are all here to help.

 

Scopes:

There are 5 types of searches you can do on the library homepage:

  1. Articles - Includes articles from most research databases, but excludes some specialized ones.
     
  2. Course Reserves - Limits to materials that professors have put on reserve for their courses. It is recommended to search by item title for specific holdings, or by course (e.g. HST 201) to return all items on reserve that class.
     
  3. General Search (default) - Searches for books, ebooks, audiovisual, print and electronic journal articles, and Summit holdings.
     
  4. WOU & Summit - Searches our materials as well as those available through other universities that participate in the Summit lending program. Sometimes our resources are buried underneath results for other schools, so check for WOU access first.
     
  5. WOU - Searches only materials that Western Oregon University owns. Recommend you use this when assisting patrons find materials.

If an item isn't available via either WOU or one of our Summit library partners, there are still other options! Patrons may still find items using:

  1. Interlibrary Loan (ILL) - A service used to locate items not held by WOU or lending Summit program libraries. ILL looks at both academic and public libraries worldwide. Patrons place ILL requests from their library account (or ILL/Summit staff can place them).
     
  2. Local Public Library System - The Monmouth Public Library is part of a public library consortium, called Chemeketa Cooperative Regional Library System (CCRLS). To get a library card, students just need to go in with a photo ID, and some kind of billing statement that shows they live locally. Once they have this card, they may pick up books from any CCRLS library, or have them delivered to the local library (similar to Summit).
    1. Monmouth Public Library Information
    2. CCRLS Catalog Search

GENERAL TIPS:

  1. Direct book-seeking patrons to begin with the WOU filter and expand to 'WOU+Summit' if WOU doesn't have an available copy. If the item isn't available in Summit (or all copies are checked out) and the patron still wants a copy, look for it in WorldCat
  2. The 'General Search' scope is likely to provide an overwhelming number of results. When assisting patrons, show them how to filter their results using facets.
  3. It is more practical for patrons to start their research article searching from an appropriate Research Guide. Patrons who want to use Primo can limit non-article items by selecting 'peer reviewed journals' and 'available at WOU' as limiting facets (see Tip #2 above).

 

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Results List & Details Screen

Item Format: Located at the top of the item record. If the item does not have a 'cover image' it will be replaced with an image of the item format. 

Basic Details: Will always have title listed at top and typically include the publisher, author and year of publication. Clicking on the title of the item record will open up the complete details for that item

Access Method/Availability/Call #: Shows ways in which the item is available to the patron, and includes Call # if physically available or part of Course Reserves. Access is color-coded:

  • Green: Available in library (not checked out) or available online
  • Orange: Not available in library (or is checked out), but is available at other Summit libraries
  • Grey: Checked out of library and not available, or library does not own and all copies available at Summit libraries are also checked out

Detailed Record Example

 

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Post-Search Filters

After you perform a search a list of filters will be present on the left side of the results page. What filters are present will depend on your initial search scope, but here are a few examples of the categories you'll commonly see. Use 'Show More' on each category to view more filters.
 

Availability: Good for narrowing down results to either electronic or physical items only. 

Resource Type: A more specific version of the 'availability limiter'. Great for limiting yourself to one specific type of material, be if physical or digital. Some patrons will look for information but want it only in journal or book form.

Date: Good for patrons who are looking for current materials only. Articles about educational learning methods from the 1930s probably won't do an edcuation major a lot of good in designing their classroom activities. However, if they were looking only for historical perspectives, it may be helpful to limit your End Date down to the 1970s

Physical Location: Also great for patrons who are looking for books in a certain section. For example, an education student who needs a book about a disability, but it needs to be child appropriate. Limiting yourself to juvenile would be very helpful

Language: Can come in handy when a patron needs the book in a specific foreign language (or is looking at a foreign topic but still needs it to be written in English

 

 

Applying Multiple Filters

You may apply more than one filter at a time by check-marking all that you want to apply. When you've selected all our filters, click the green 'Apply Filters' icon at the bottom of your screen

Excluding Categories

You may also refine results by exclusion. When hovering over any filter, check-mark the red box of all categories that you wish to exclude, then click the green 'Apply Filters' icon at the bottom of your screen.

 

 

Advanced Searching

The 'Advanced Search' function can be accessed from the bottom-right side of the search box, and is the default view on the Kiosk machines.

 

There are 3 important elements to the Advanced Search function:

1. Search Scope - The default search scope is very broad, so delimit to down to 'WOU' or 'WOU & Summit' before searching.

2. Pre-Filters - You can limit down your search results by material type (book, journal, etc), language (english, french, etc), and by year (last 5, 10, 20). 

3. Boolean Operators - If searching for more than one keyword/phrase, you will use the boolean operators AND, OR, NOT
 


 

Boolean Operators

 

Each Boolean operator will have a different effect on your search results. 

AND: Requires that both search words are present, otherwise it will not be returned as a result. The more 'AND' operators you add, the narrower your results will be (until you get zero matches)

OR: When you want to find either term. Good for finding results that include one term or another that are similar. Examples could be: 'education OR teaching', 'Facebook OR Twitter', etc

NOT: When you want exclude a term that is similar to the one you want. For example, I want research on football, but I'm not interested in college football, or futbal (soccer). Ex: 'football NOT college NOT soccer'

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Course Reserves

The course reserves are populated of items that WOU owns, as well as personal items that departments or professors “loan” to the library each term (or longer). 

Search 'Course Reserves' using either the following:

  • Course Code/Number (i.e. PSY 301)
  • Name of the Book (i.e. 'Discovering Nutrition')

Once the patron has found the item, they will need to take the call number over to the checkout desk

 

Some course materials will appear with a Library of Congress call number (i.e. RS57 .M67 2014), while others will appear as “##-### pc” (i.e 17-67 pc). This denotes that the material is a “personal copy” which was provided by a faculty member or department. 
 

If a patron is logged into their account, they can view how long they are allowed to check out the item. Checkout lengths for course reserves vary and are determined by the professor.

There are five categories of checkout length:

  • 4-hour (most common)
  • 1 day
  • 3 day
  • 7 day
  • Full Term

 

For Advanced Users:

If you know that the reserves for a specific class have been added, you can look up to see if the record exists in Alma. 

 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 

Accessing Online Materials

Patrons may access both books and journal resources electronically. Some resources, typically journals, will have a variety of access methods and date ranges.

Online Books:

Click on the 'Online Access' area to open up the item's full details.


 

The patron will need to sign in to their account in order to see what full-text methods are available. If they are on the campus network, they will not be required to sign in.
 



 

Online Journals:

Journals that the university has online access to work mostly the same as electronic books, but there will be coverage restrictions (what years are available), and some resources are only available via an "as-needed" service called 'Get It Now'.
 


 

This particular journal is availalbe from three different databases. Two of them have access starting from 2001, and one of them is from 1998 to current. 
 

We can also purchase specific articles from 1978 and 1998 using the 'Get It Now' on-demand service.
 


 

NOTE:  'Get It Now' does not allow you to browse journal articles (like the regular databases would) but is used for accessing specific articles. 
 



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Request Options (Digitization, Lending)

WOU patrons (students, staff/faculty) may also request access to items in a variety of ways (including access to a course reserve):

When a user is logged in and is viewing a WOU-owned item, they will see a Request Options link. Clicking that link will open a new tab where the user can select one of the available options.

[All]

  • This be mailed to me or held at the library for pick up
    • The patron will be asked whether they want the item held or mailed.
    • If the patron selected 'mailed', they will be asked to confirm their mailing address.
       
  • A portion of this be digitized and sent directly to me
    • The patron will be asked to confirm the details of what they want scanned, and what portions (e.g. page range, chapters). Due to copyright, we are limited to scanning 10-15% of any given text.
    • Alternatively, saff/faculty may come to the library with materials they own and fill out a digitization request form located in the info drawer. See Digitization Requests for more information.

[Staff/Faculty]

  • This be digitized and made available to my students through the library's digital reserves system (print items only)
    • This faculty/staff option will take them to the Reserves/Booking Materials submission page where they will be asked to provide specific course information, as well as what chapters/sections they intend to use for class.
    • Once submitted, these requests are routed to the information desk. See Controlled Digital Lending Processing for additional information.
  • This be digitized and made embeddable in my online course shell (videos only)
    • This faculty/staff option will take them to the Digitization Request form, where they will provide specific course information, and when the video is needed by.
    • Once submitted, these requests are routed to Academic Innovation for processing.

 

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Patron Requests for Summit Items

This process describes how to guide a patron through ordering an item from the Summit program. If you are ordering a Summit item on behalf of another patron, please follow the steps for ordering an item for a patron in Alma.

Once you've found an item available in Summit that you'd like to order, click on the item title to open up the full record.

 

If you are not already signed into your portal page or library account, you will need to do so in order to complete a Summit ordering request. Once you are signed into your account, click the appropriate Summit request link.

 

 

A new tab will open allowing the patron to finalize the request, select a pickup or shipping location, and sign up to receive SMS notifcations.

 

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Patron Interlibrary Loan Request

NOTE: You cannot place an ILL request on behalf of a patron, they need to be logged into their 'My Library' account to access the ILL request feature. If you're working with a patron online and they're having trouble, either forward them to, or provide the contact information for the ILL/Summit coordinator.

  1. On the library homepage, have the patron click the 'My Library' and login to their account.
  2. Click the 'New ILL Request' tab to be taken to the ILL service. If it is the patron's first time logging into the service, they may be asked to verify their home address.
  3. Have the patron fill out all required fields in the form, plus any others which may be beneficial like edition and year.

 

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