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New Faculty Resources and Services

Hilton M. Briggs Library welcomes new faculty to South Dakota State University! Librarians and staff are here to help you with your teaching and research needs.

Click the For Faculty link to learn about what the library has to offer you. The link will provide information on instruction services, the SDSU institutional repository Open PRAIRIE, copyright, and much more. Don't forget to check out the ever-expanding Archives & Special Collections physical and digital materials, or the extensive government documents collection. Below, we've highlighted some library resources and services that will be helpful as you get started in your role as a faculty member. Please contact us if you have any questions.

Accessing Library Resources Off-Campus

Access to library resources from off campus is easy! Link to the database or resource you need by starting from the library’s home page. Then, when prompted, enter your SDSU network credentials (the same login that you use for your university email or InsideState).

Additional services are available to all SDSU faculty, staff, and students who cannot make regular (at least weekly) trips to the Brookings area. These include article and book delivery, off-campus instruction, and remote research assistance.

Faculty who are delivering distance courses may be interested in our guide to resources for teaching online.

For help or more information, contact a librarian or the Library Services Desk at blref@sdstate.edu or 605-688-5107 or 800-786-2038.

Instruction

Subject Librarians can help your students become familiar with library resources by offering online or in-person classroom instruction or providing your students individual consultations. Explore your opportunities for library instruction services.

Subject Librarians at Briggs

Subject Librarians support your scholarship and teaching by:

  • Collaborating on design of effective research assignments
  • Providing research instruction to students in your courses
  • Supporting students, in-person and online, with research assignments
  • Consulting on in-depth research questions
  • Participating in graduate and undergraduate student orientation activities
  • Facilitating access to library resources
  • Updating faculty about new services and resources

Subject Librarians work with faculty on developing the library’s collections. We value your input on journal subscriptions and book purchases. Each department has a designated representative to coordinate purchases of library materials. You can forward book requests to your department’s library representative who then decides what will be purchased with the funds available; or use the online recommendation form for journals, available on the For Faculty page. Book requests are sent to your department’s library representative for approval and journal recommendations are sent to your Subject Librarian for consideration.

Meet our Subject Librarians and areas of responsibility:

  • Michele Christian for American Indian Studies; Archives & Special Collections
  • Kristin Echtenkamp for School of Design (Architecture; Interior Design; Landscape Architecture; Visual Arts); English 101; Speech 101; School of Journalism and Communication
  • Elizabeth Fox for School of Health and Consumer Sciences; History, Political Science, Philosophy, & Religion; School of Performing Arts (Music, Theatre, and Dance); Jerome J. Lohr College of Engineering; Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Military Science
  • Linda Kott for School of English and Interdisciplinary Studies; School of Psychology, Sociology, and Rural Studies; School of American & Global Studies (Modern Languages & Global Studies); School of Education, Counseling & Human Development)
  • Nancy Marshall for Agricultural & Biosystems Engineering; Agronomy, Horticulture & Plant Science; Animal Science; Dairy & Food Science; Natural Resource Management; Veterinary & Biomedical Sciences
  • Aine O'Connor for Biology and Microbiology; Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Physics; Geography and Geospatial Studies; and Ness School of Management and Economics; Nursing; Pharmacy and Allied Health Professions

Textbooks

Briggs Library's e-textbook program has saved SDSU students over $519,623 since May 2020. When possible, the library will purchase unlimited use e-textbooks from participating publishers. Contact your subject librarian for more information and to check if an e-textbook is available for your course.

Open Educational Resources

Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others. Some benefits of OER include an increase in retention; cost savings to students by replacing textbooks with free materials; and providing opportunities for creativity, collaboration, and innovative teaching. Contact our Systems and Discovery Librarian, Shari Theroux, with questions.

Open PRAIRIE

Open PRAIRIE is the SDSU institutional repository. It supports the collection, preservation, and dissemination of SDSU’s scholarly and creative output from faculty, staff, and students. Open PRAIRIE also allows for permanent storage of, and public access to, institutional materials. Thousands of SDSU documents have been downloaded from Open PRAIRIE more than a million times worldwide. For more information, contact Electronic Resources and Scholarly Communications Librarian Michael Biondo.

Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery

If the library does not have access to what you need, books, scanned articles, and other materials can be obtained through Interlibrary Loan (ILL) from other libraries in South Dakota or beyond. Our document delivery service provides scans of articles/chapters available in print in the library. Submit requests from library databases or via the ILL link on our homepage. Contact ILL at 605-688-5573 or illsdsu@sdstate.edu.

Circulation

Check out materials, equipment, study rooms, and more using your SDSU employee I.D. card. Faculty and staff may borrow circulating collection materials for one year, with a due date of Oct. 1. Bound periodicals are checked out for one week. See our Reserves guide for information about short-term check-out for items your students will need for course assignments.

Copyright

Copyright is a set of rights given to the creator of an original work fixed in a tangible medium. Explore our Copyright LibGuides to learn about copyright compliance.

Scholarly Impact

As you begin to create your Faculty Annual Review (FAR), you can use the library's guide on evaluating scholarly publications for tenure and promotion to find resources on altmetrics, journal impact factor, and other measures of value for publications.

The Division of Research and Economic Development has resources related to finding and applying for grants. Librarians are happy to help with preliminary research as you prepare to apply for grants.