Free Tutoring at the Library

Overwhelmed?

Free tutoring is available at the Library in the Interdisciplinary Tutoring Center (ITC) on the top floor.

Walk-in tutoring is available during Library open hours.

Appointments can be made for 30-minute tutoring sessions. Appointments are available Monday - Thursday 10 am - 2 pm. Stop by the Library ITC Desk to make your appointment today!

We are open on Saturday

SWC Library Hours - Chula Vista campus
Saturday: 10 am - 2 pm

Have a question but the Library is closed? Ask us now!

Is this George Washington's handwriting?

If your instructors ask you to use primary sources in your research projects, it means that you should find original documents created during the time period you are studying.

Where to find them?

Thanks to ambitious digitization projects, many historical archives are now available online! Check out American Memory, created by the Library of Congress.

The American Memory site is a very large and sophisticated collection of historical documents -- a digital record of American history. It contains audio recordings, images, manuscripts, maps, and videos that chronicle historic events, places, and people. You can browse by U.S. regions, cities, and time periods; as well as by topics such as immigration, African American history, technology, culture, or sports. Read handwritten documents by American presidents, look through dance instruction manuals from centuries ago, or take a look at examples of newspaper ads published in the 1920s.

The American Memory project started more than 20 years ago, and the collection is constantly expanding: it contains more than 9 million digitized documents.

Primary sources are also available on other public and Government sites. The National Archives and Records Administration, the agency that digitizes U.S. Government archival materials, contains more than 12 billion pages of unique documents!

If you want to learn more about working with historical documents, attend one of the Library's Primary Sources workshops or ask a librarian next time you are in the campus library.

 World War I Sheet Music Collection

Review by Svetlana Kondratenko, SWC Librarian 

Check It Out

Her: Meditations on Being Female

by Marjorie Salvaterra

Glitterati Incorporated, 2016

Call Number:  Stacks TR681.W6 S25 2016

Last month was Women’s History Month! It gave us a chance to celebrate the lives and legacies of so many women who made our planet a better place to live, or to just think about the universal idea of womanhood.

In the Library’s Stacks section, I found a great book that definitely put me in that spirit. Her: Meditations on Being Female is an inspiring collection of engaging, fun, and thought-provoking photographs of women. This is how the author, Marjorie Salvaterra, a very talented Los Angeles photographer, described her book: “Surreal and non-specific… Her is my story. And her story. It’s about the many roles we play as women – as wives, mothers, daughters, individuals, friends… and trying to balance all those roles – somehow while still looking unflappable. Or so we think.”

The book has excellent reviews on Amazon and other sites for book lovers. It is available for four-week check out with your SWC photo ID card.

Review by Svetlana Kondratenko, SWC Librarian

Are we still in a drought?

Are we still in a drought?

 

 

Check out this article from the New York Times! The article highlights a NASA project, from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, known as Airborne Snow Observatory. This project, which started in 2013, has been taking aerial imagery of the snow areas of California to gather data on snow packs. Melted snow in spring and summer is a very important source of water for California.

 “The snow observatory project, which began flights over the Sierra in 2013, is a groundbreaking initiative in California, where aging infrastructure, a warming climate and rapid population growth have made water management a high-stakes job.” If you'd like to look at the raw data -- how they collect it, the instruments used, etc -- check out the project at https://aso.jpl.nasa.gov.

The New York Times article includes impressive images, as well as interactive maps comparing bare mountains in 2015 with snow packed mountains of 2017.

So, maybe we are still out of drought but this snow is providing some relief and, for those who enjoy skiing and other winter sports, a prolonged snow season is in store.

Review by Laura Galvan-Estrada, SWC Librarian

Need to know the basics?

Working on an essay? A presentation? A research paper?

Join us for a free half-hour workshop on Thursday!

We'll provide a brief overview of how to find the best sources for your project. Get a jump on finishing your assignment.

30 Minute Thursdays -- Library 101

Noon - Room L-244

Online/Hybrid student? Join us!

Taking an online class during the Spring Second Session? Not sure about how to use Blackboard or Canvas?

Stop by our two-hour open Help Lab on Tuesday, April 4, 3 pm - 5 pm in Room L-244. We will be available to answer questions and help to get you started!