Services

Welcome, UA Graduate Students!

• Are you looking for help to get started with your thesis or dissertation research?
• Do you need a quick review of library search techniques?
• Would you like to learn more about managing your citations?

Explore the resources and services that are available to you through this site.

Watch Library Overview for Graduate Students (Flash Player required).

Enroll in Online Grad Course

The University of Arizona Libraries offers an entirely online, one-credit 10 week course on information research strategies focused on the library research needs of graduate students.

Topics include:

• Developing advanced-level database searching skills for conducting comprehensive literature reviews
• Managing citations and creating bibliographies
• Copyright basics
• The "open access" movement in academia

Students can register for LIBR 696a through UA Access. It is listed under "Library Studies."

See course overview and syllabus or contact Jill Newby or Jeanne Pfander for more information.
 

Let us know what you think of the web pages for Grad Students.

Using the Library

Introduction to Library Services
Learn all about resources and services of special interest to graduate students. This is a Flash-based video presentation.

Ask a Librarian
Connect with a variety of services to help you with your research, including live chat, email reference, reference desk assistance and meeting with a librarian.

Circulation & Borrowing Information
Information on circulation and borrowing policies and procedures.

Scholars' Corner
A quiet reading room for UA faculty and graduate students at the Main Library.

Long Term Study Rooms
Quiet study carrels for PhD candidates and faculty members. Available for long-term  use at the Main and Science-Engineering Libraries.

Study Spaces
Find out about all other study spaces, including our group and quiet study rooms and computer study areas.

Interlibrary Loan
A service that provides access to materials not owned by the UA Libraries.

Document Delivery
Find out how to have articles and book chapters scanned and e-mailed to you.

Instructional Services
If you are teaching on campus, find out how we can help you through consultations, tutorials, and more.

Campus Repository Service
If you have scholarly output you would like to both store and share with others, find out how you can deposit it with us through our Campus Repository Service.

Search & Find

Article & Database Searching
Provides access to articles in popular and scholarly journals. The database list is alphabetical by title and by subject or discipline

Subject Guides
Provides a list of subject oriented resource guides. Guides include descriptions of the major resources in the discipline.

UA Library Catalog
A database of the vast array of resources of the UA Libraries. Many items are now in digital formats. The catalog provides multiple points of access to the materials.

WorldCat Local
A catalog of records for materials cataloged by libraries throughout the world, including UA Libraries. It includes some journal articles.

Center for Research Libraries (CRL)
A consortium that makes available, through interlibrary loan and electronic delivery, hard to find newspapers, journals, documents, archives and other traditional and digital resources for research and teaching.

Dissertations and Theses - Full Text (ProQuest)
A database of all doctoral dissertations and some master's theses from most North American and many European colleges and universities.

Citation Management

There are a number of citation management programs.  The UA Libraries has a campus-wide license to the first two programs listed below.  

• RefWorks    RefWorks Guide
  RefWorks is a web-based citation manager program available to UA faculty, staff and students. It allows one to import citations from many of our databases, or input them manually, and then create bibliographies automatically in the desired style format.
   
• Write-n-Cite is a related software program that can be downloaded and installed from the Refworks site. This program works within MS Word as you write your paper to allow you to access your citations stored in RefWorks and to automatically create footnotes and a bibliography.
   
• EndNote Web     EndNote Web Tutorials
  EndNote Web is a bibliographic management program that will help you collect and import references from online databases; organize your references for your research topics and papers and create a formatted bibliography for your paper or cite references while you write.  All UA staff, students, and faculty are eligible for a free EndNote Web account.
   
• Zotero     Zotero Quick Start Guide
  A free, easy-to-use Firefox extension to help you collect, manage, cite, and share your research sources.  If you have set up an account in Zotero and synced your library on their server, you can also view, but not modify, your library from any computer through your online account. Another option for using your Zotero library on multiple computers is to use portable Firefox with Zotero on a USB flash drive.

  RefWorks/EndNote/Zotero Features Comparison Chart 
  (University of Wisconsin Libraries)
   

Citation Style Guides

• Research and Documentation Online
  Diana Hacker's excellent site focuses on MLA, Chicago Style, APA, and CBE styles with sample papers and good examples.
   

• OWL - Purdue Online Writing Lab
  Good descriptions and examples for APA, MLA and Chicago Style.

• Discipline Specific Citation Guides
  Information and links to citation style guides from such areas as Agriculture to Medicine to Sociology.
   

Preparation & Submission of UA Dissertations and Theses

• UA Graduate College Manuals for submission of Theses & Dissertations   (includes specific formatting requirements)
   
• UMI Electronic submission web site for UA (includes formatting requirements, various publishing guides on copyright and other topics, help for creating PDFs and more)

Preventing Plagiarism

Accidental Plagiarism - Don't Let it Happen to You (Tutorial)
A concise depiction of what constitutes plagiarism and tips to preventing plagiarism.

 Ask a Librarian
 Use our Ask a Librarian service via chat, email or phone.
 
Online tutorials
Check out our quick online tutorials to get up- to-speed on library research techniques and databases.

Subject Guides
Looking for discipline-specific article databases?  Go to the list of  Subject Guides for suggestions by discipline.