Kudos about OSLIS

Comments about the OSLIS Web Site and Citation Maker

We sincerely thank all of the students, librarians, teachers, and media specialists who have taken the time to write us about the OSLIS Web site. We welcome your comments and suggestions, and are honored by your enthusiasm. These are just a few of the many e-mails we've received:

Fall 2007
Hi, My name is Judy Sudderth and I am the media Specialist at McKibben Lane Elem. in Macon, Ga. I stumbled upon your wonderful web site while surfing for Library ideas. I must say it is great! I am getting ready to construct a new web page for my school and I would like one that will be helpful for our students as well as parents. May I have your permission to use your Learn How to section on our school web site? I will be happy to give credit to the originator. Thank you for this wonderful site!
Judy Sudderth, Ms.Ed.,NBCT
Media Specialist
Lane Elem.

Spring 2007
The ODE Superintendent's Pipeline contained this article in their April newsletter.

Large increase in OSLIS usage-better literacy skills for Oregon's students!

So far this school year, students and staff have conducted 2.4 million searches on the Oregon Student Library Information System (OSLIS) website at http://www.oslis.org.

The largest monthly increase occurred between January and February-from 467,131 to 608,784 searches. This data indicates that students are engaged in more research than previously.

Access to the EBSCOhost database through OSLIS gives students opportunities to become skilled in research; engaging in research also hones students' reading and writing skills. To that end, the Oregon Department of Education purchases the yearly site license for K-12 EBSCOhost databases for every school in the state, and the Oregon State Library supports the OSLIS interface.

The Student Research Center for grades 5 and above is the most used OSLIS interface. Through this set of databases, students and staff can determine which content sources-magazines, newspapers, biographies, maps, images, film & video-they will include in their searches. Limiting searches according to Lexile reading levels, searching by topic heading, using an online dictionary and encyclopedia, and exploring the top searches of the day are just some of the searching capabilities using OSLIS!

We are teaching our 40 fourth graders how to cite sources in a research project. We've found your Elementary Citation Maker to be very useful..What a great website you have! We have nothing comparable in Ohio. Thanks for sharing.

Email sent to Patty Sorensen from librarian, Nancy Strahl ,at Roosevelt Elementary in Medford:

That is what I like about OSLIS...always improving things and
thinking of the next step. The easier you make it for the teachers, the more they will use the site. Nancy

Nancy Strahl x3438
Roosevelt Elementary - Medford

Winter 2006

Patty Sorensen was notified by ProQuest that abstract and index information for "Oregon School Library Information System (OSLIS) PowerPoints" which were published in the PNLA Quarterly have been included as part of the LISA: Library and Information Science Abstracts database from ProQuest CSA.

Rosanne Cerny at the Queens Library in Jamacia, NY was given permission to copy/adapt pages on the OSLIS website and was pointed to the OSLIS Policy on Reproduction.
http://www.oslis.org/index.php?page=sitePolicy. Rosanne's request is reprinted below.

We really like the elementary pages on OSLIS, and were wondering if we can copy/adapt them for our library website.  We of course have subscriptions to the same databases, and could do our own links and customize some of the Oregon-centric things to New York City & State. I don't know the technical stuff involved here, but this seems like one of those "why reinvent the wheel" projects, and we would be of course willing to give you credit for developing the idea.

Library Development chose the OSLIS trainings as the project to propose to the U of Michigan for evaluation.  It was accepted and Patty will be working with two students to do an in-depth analysis of the OSLIS trainings that have done and those that are being done in the near future.  Their results won't be available until late spring but this might be perfect timing for OSLIS 2.0 and the focus of those presentations.

Fall 2005
The Oregon State Library sent out a press release about the time school started about the "new" OSLIS. The press release was printed in whole or in part by the Eugene Register Guard, the Daily Astorian and the Beaverton Valley Times.

OEMA President Jim Tindall reports that OSLIS was mentioned at a pre-conference at the American Association of School Librarians in Pittsburgh in October.

OEMA has recently given permission to include reference to OSLIS in
two different books being written.
1. Dr. Rich Forcier is currently writing his 5th edition of "The Computer as an Educational Tool: Productivity and Problem Solving" (Prentice Hall). He has asked for permission to use reproductions of OSLIS website screen shots. Rich is a retired professor at Western Oregon, OEMA lifetime member, as 1993-04 OEMA President.
2. Brook A. Berg, Library Media Director at Detroit Lakes Middle School in Detroit Lakes MN is currently writing a book for librarians and teachers on plagiarism. He has been given permission to include the information (name and url) on Citation Maker in the lesson plans and resources in the back of the book.

Fall 2006 From the Beaverton School District
Patty,
I've been using Citation Maker with 5th graders the last 3 weeks and love the improvements that you've made in the past year! So much more efficient. Love the sort option, too :) Thanks for all your work on this site!

From Talent Middle School
I would just like to say thank you for this great resource and for all the work that goes into it. It has continued to get better and better. I use OSLIS all the time and continually recommend it to all the teachers and staff at my school.

February 2, 2004 Kathy O'Neal, Librarian, Lake Library, Laurel School, Shaker Heights, Ohio

Your web site on citations is super! I wanted to know if you would give permission for me to print copies of your citation examples for my students to use in the library while learning about citations?

January 23, 2004  Debbie Teague, Holladay Elementary School, Richmond, Virginia

I am the technology coordinator for a small private school in York PA. Let me tell you what a wonderful resource your Web site has been to me as I strive to teach my 6th graders about research and citing resources. Your citing resources worksheet is a wonderful tool.

January 22, 2004  Mary Harshall, Saint Joseph Elementary School, York, Pennsylvania

Hi, I am a media specialist in NC and bumped into your page on the Internet. The citation maker and notes are wonderful...the best thing I have come across for elementary schools.

January 20, 2004  Sue Newcomb, North Carolina

We think your Citation Maker is one of the best citation tools we've found and would like to request permission to link to it from our library website. Many thanks for your assistance!

January 26, 2004  Deborah Locke, Librarian, Westbrook High School, Westbrook, Maine

I visited your OSLIS How to Cite Sources website that was recommended by Kathy Schrock at the EMAnj Conference. I'm teaching students in Grades 3-5 how to do research and cite sources, and I would like to use your "Citation Examples" to show a model of how to cite the different types of sources that students might use during research. Thank you!

January 16, 2004  Denise Kreiger, Media Specialist, Conover Road Elementary School, Colts Neck, NJ

Thank you for making life easy! I am a senior at Waterville Senior High School in Maine. While writing a paper tonight my brother started reading over my shoulder and asked me a question about works cited. I took him to our schools webpage so he could see how we were taught to do it. To this day I still have to look at this paper to make sure I am doing it right. To make a long story short it was he who taught me a better way. One of his teachers used your web page to teach the JR. High kids how to do works cited. I have to tell you it is the best way to learn it and it is a easy setup to use. I plan to pass the word along to my friends!

January 6, 2004, A., High School Senior, Maine

We work very hard to insure that our students cite their resources properly. Your page is extremely helpful and easy to use.

December 12, 2003  Kathy Brown, Media Specialist, West Middle School, Cherry Creek SD, Colorado

Many thanks for a wonderful product.

December 9, 2003  Joe Macksey, Library Media Specialist, Lincoln Fundamental School, Davenport, Iowa

Thank you so much for having this website! It helped me tremendously!

December 7, 2003  Tiffany T., Bishop State Community College, Mobile, Alabama

Hello. I am a high school student in an advanced literature class that requires much writing (and subsequent citations). Your site has been a God-send. Thank you for all the hard work and great content you have put into it...I am very impressed, pleased, and grateful for your work with this site. It has really saved me so far this year. Thank you!

December 3, 2003  Whitney, A Happy High School Senior

Dear Library Media Specialists! What a wonderful job you did in creating your pages on search strategies. I am asking permission to use some of your worksheets in a project I am working on for remedial high school students (those who don't have Internet access at home).

December 3, 2003  Donna S. Assion, Library Media Specialist, Ocean Lakes High School, Virginia Beach, Virginia

Wow, awesome site. I am adding a link to our school web site for our students to use if that is OK.

December 2, 2003  Jane Flynn, Cleburne Independent School District, Texas

I am in the process of developing an "academic integrity" handbook for my high school. I was very impressed with your MLA Citing Sources website. It is very straight forward and easy to use and is exactly what our students & staff need to know. Thank you.

November 19, 2003  Susan Webb, Media Specialist, Farmington High School, Farmington, Missouri

I just took a look at your Citation Maker. It is so cool!:-) Wow!

November 17, 2003  Tami Junkermeier, Media Specialist, Minnetonka Middle School West, Excelsior, Minnesota

Thank you so much for making Works Cited maker! This has seriously helped me out so much! Writing bibliographies is a hard part of my paper, and I just love your website, it's so easy to use and helped me out so much! Thanks!

November 13, 2003  Dan S., Student

I have finally gotten around to looking at all of my Kathy Schrock SOS and found your site listed there. I love the citation maker, it would save my English teachers and myself hours checking the correct form, etc.

November 12, 2003   Cynthia K. Russell-Marshall, District Librarian, Garaway Local School, Sugarcreek, Ohio
Hey, I would like to thank you guys for your wonderful help on citing in my papers. Without it I think I would be totally lost on how to do it. You have a great program for people to use.

November 10, 2003  Chris J., Student

Your Citation Maker page on your website is awesome.

November 8, 2003  Debby Bridge and Cynthia Wolfe, Librarians, Temple High School, Temple, Texas

I am the presiding officer of the members' council for GorgeLINK, a three-county union catalog serving Wasco, Sherman, and Hood River counties. We are just on the brink of having a Web presence. May we make a link to the Citation Maker?

November 7, 2003  Jim Tindall, District Librarian, The Dalles, Oregon

This is a request to post online your web page address with a hot link. The link would be in an online environment for employees called JCPS Online and on the Jefferson County Public Schools Library Media Services web page. We would like to keep this information online indefinitely.

November 6, 2003  Jeanie Fridell, Resource Librarian, JCPS Gheens Professional Library, Jefferson County Public  Schools, Kentucky

To the Clever Designer, I would like to include a link to your secondary citation page for my middle school research page. While we already have noodlebib, I find your page to be exceptional.

October 30, 2003  Anne Tope Edwards, Librarian, Charlotte Country Day School, North Carolina

I am a high school librarian who is very impressed with your citation maker. Our school district has 4 libraries in it who would love to link to your citation maker for our students' use. Is this acceptable with you?

October 28, 2003  Beverely Oliver, High School Librarian, Indian Hill School District, Cincinnati, Ohio

I am a teacher in Nova Scotia Canada. I am presently setting up courses for an online school for high school students. I work for Chignecto Central Regional School Board. I am asking about permission to link to your Works Cited as a site for students to go to help them with essay writing and citing sources. Thank you.

October 28, 2003  Lesley Higgins-Elchuck, Technology Integration Learning Specialist, Nova Scotia, Canada

Thanks for creating citation maker!

October 22, 2003  Michele Velthuizen, Middle School Librarian, American School of The Hague, The Netherlands

I just wanted to thank you for creating such a wonderful site. I am currently working at a K . 12 private school on Kauai and have sent the Citation Maker to every teacher in the school! My husband, who teaches English at the community college, said it was the most helpful MLA style site he.s seen. Thanks again for helping both students and teachers in all disciplines!

October 14, 2003  Joyce Flagg, Librarian, Island School, Hawaii

Wow! I received the URL to your web site through Kathy Schrock's S.O.S. Help for Busy Teachers mailing list. This is the most helpful, "kid friendly" site I've ever seen on citing works. My 5th grade students are currently working on a research project, and your site will prove to be invaluable.

October 14, 2003  Debbie Blackwell, 5th grade gifted/talented teacher, Pine Tree Independent School District, Texas

I am in love with your citation maker. So clear and easy and simple.

October 14, 2003 Sue Bognar, Technology Librarian, Moriah College, Bondi Junction, New South Wales

I've long been a fan of your Citation Maker and I am delighted in your latest revision. You've made 1000 people very happy.

October 13, 2003  Cheryl Beatty, Library Media Specialist, Roger Ludlowe Middle School, Fairfield, Connecticut

As a solo librarian without district support I don't have time to support my students in all the ways I would like to. I am very impressed with your website. What a great resource for the students of Oregon!

October 3, 2003  Carol Ann Sass, Librarian, Bishop Machebeuf High School, Denver, Colorado

Good afternoon I am spending my summer organizing the numerous websites I have collected this year. Your citation maker was linked in an email from LM_net listserv. I think it is terrific and would love to link to it for my 3rd and 4th graders this school year.

July 6, 2003   Sandy Bryan, Librarian, River Oaks Baptist School, Houston, Texas

OEMA has been working for the past two years with a non-profit educational organization called Oregon Websites and Watersheds, helping to judge their annual website contest. At the most recent meeting, I demonstrated the OSLIS site for them and they requested permission to add the OSLIS link on their pages..

May 21, 2003  Garnetta Wilker, Library Technology Specialist, Lake Oswego Junior High School, Lake Oswego, OR

I love your website. Your explanations in the how to research section are so clear and well done.

March 31, 2003  Laurie Levitt, Media Specialist, High Point Elementary, Maryland

I LOVE this site. It was presented to us on an in-service day and I.m so glad to know about it.

March 11, 2003  Karen Kitt, Language Arts Teacher, Hartman Middle School, Redmond, Oregon

I am a library media specialist in Erlanger, KY and I love your web page on How to Cite Works. Someone did a wonderful job!

January 22, 2003  Karen Boyle, Library Media Specialist, Lloyd High School, Erlanger, Kentucky

Dear Sir or Madame: I must teach a "Computer Basics" class to sixth graders next semester for which I create the curriculum. I have just paged through your site on research using the Web and found it terrific. This is a sincere thank you for creating and maintaining the site.

December 5, 2002  Sheila House

I'm an 8th grade student in Connecticut, and I was doing my homework, but I couldn't find out how to make a work-cited page. I looked on google, and I found your webpage! Thanks so much! It was a very impressive and helpful site! Thanks again!

November 24, 2002  Chelsea N., Student, Connecticut

Your site has been very helpful in citing a bunch of different projects I've done. Thanks a lot.

October 31, 2002  Kevin M., Student

I was introduced to your website Thursday, and felt it was excellent! I plan to bring our 2nd - 5th grade students into the library to research science topics via our resources and Internet.and would like permission to use your website with them. It is user-friendly and holds a wealth of information at our students' level..The "How to Cite Works" and "Glossary" pages are clear and to the point.

September 22, 2002  Janie B. Flores, Librarian, N.G. Cavazos Elementary, La Joya Independent School District, Texas

Your "Cite Works" in the OSLIS Elementary section is wonderful! Could I bookmark it for my school's library site? We are a small (375 K-12 students) school in upstate New York and I would like to use it to teach my elementary students the mechanics of proper bibliographic citation.

May 21, 2002  Marilyn Trienens, School Librarian, Willsboro Central School, Willsboro, New York

I would love any information you are willing to share about how your form was created. It looks like something I have wanted to do for a very long time but have limited experience on how to make this happen. What a wonderful tool for your students. I hope they realize how lucky they are to have this.

May 16, 2002  Lynda Homet, Library Media Specialist, Towanda Area Middle School, Towanda, Pennsylvania

I am a Middle School Information Specialist from Omaha, Nebraska. The reason I'm writing is to confirm that it is o.k. to link to your "How to Cite Works." pages from our school web site. I have done considerable research on the topic and have found that your site is very well done and will be an excellent teaching tool, even at the Middle School level..Thank you so much for providing such valuable information for educators and students!

January 11, 2002  Linda Nichols, Information Specialist, Beadle Middle School, Omaha, Nebraska

Many kudos for your well designed web site ---I really the interactive features -- I particularly liked the works cited section where the students write their own.

September 23, 2001  Charlotte Hanselman, Christian Brothers College High School, St. Louis, Missouri