SPSC Information Literacy Resources

This page was created by the Transportation Library for students and instructors of the Northwestern University Center For Public Safety [1]'s School of Police Staff and Command [2].

Schedule of current and upcoming SPSC classes [3]

SPSC Information Literacy Class Outline:

• Times are approximate and vary according to each instructional situation.
• Introduction: Review of handouts; goals of class, etc. (10 mins)
• Power Point Presentation-Information Literacy (on-going throughout the class).
• Introduction to concept of Information Literacy (10 mins).
• Demonstration of NUcat (10 mins) - Searching the catalog of the Northwestern University Libraries.
• Demonstration of TRAN (10 mins) - Searching for articles indexed in TRANweb
• Demonstration of NCJRS (10mins) - Connecting to and searching the NCJRS document database.
• Break (10 mins)
• Review and demonstration of Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice e-resources (60 minutes).
• Break (10 mins)
• Locating Materials Locally (30 mins) - How to find research materials in local libraries and order materials from the Transportation Library (Offsite classes only).
• Evaluating information.(10-15 mins)
• Search Strategy exercise (30-40mins, depending on size of class)
• Library Tour, after class, is optional (20 mins).

  Handouts for Onsite and Offsite Classes:

• Library Orientation (How to write a research paper) [4] (Power Point presention)
• Information Literacy [5] (Power Point presention)
• You must have Microsoft Power Point version 97 or higher installed on your machine to view these slide shows.

Reference Service For Currently Enrolled SPSC students only:

Contact Kay Geary, Reference Librarian for the Transportation Library of Northwestern University for reference assistance, at:

m-geary@northwestern.edu [6].

Links to Library Resources

• NU Transportation Library [7] -- home page
• Law Enforcement & Criminal Justice Subject Guide [8] -- electronic databases
• NUcat [9] -- The online catalog of the Northwestern University Libraries, including the Transportation Library.
• TRANweb [10] -- An index of articles in the Transportation Library's periodicals collection, covering law enforcement.
• NCJRS Document Database [11] -- A Web-accessible database containing summaries of criminal justice literature, government reports, journal articles, books, and more.