Fall 2015 ArcGIS workshops at Rodgers Library

While geographic information systems are the tools of choice for geographers, geographic information technologies have applications in many disciplines. Tools used by geographers to map the earth’s surface can be used by biologists to track migration patterns, social scientists to identify food deserts, epidemiologists to monitor the spread of disease, and humanists to create literary and historical maps.

This semester, the Department of Geography’s Dr. Steven Ericson will teach two introductory workshops on the widely used ArcGIS suite of GIS software. Continue reading

Fall 2015 NVivo workshops

We had a great response to our first NVivo workshops in the spring and are happy to offer three sessions this semester. Two introductory workshops will be held in the Alabama Digital Humanities Center and McLure Library. While NVivo is most often described as software for qualitative and mixed methods research, it’s a also a great tool for literature review, regardless of discipline, something we’ll discuss in an October workshop at McLure. Continue reading

Fall 2015 Esri Story Maps workshops

The well-liked Esri Story Maps workshops and are back this semester. Also returning is the Geography department’s Dr. Steven Ericson, instructor. Dr. Ericson will teach two sessions on how to create and publish interactive web maps combining text, photos, video, and audio with Esri’s cloud-based mapping and GIS system, ArcGIS Online.  Continue reading

Fall 2015 SPSS workshops at McLure Library

Available on computers throughout the University Libraries, IBM SPSS Statistics is a collection of products used to access and manage data, select and perform analyses, and share results. This semester, the College of Education’s Dr. Sara Tomek will teach three SPSS workshops at McLure Library: Introduction to SPSS, Advanced SPSS: ANOVA, and Advanced SPSS: Categorical Data. Continue reading

Fall 2015 Academic Technologies workshops open for registration

Registration for Fall 2015 Academic Technologies workshops is now open! This semester will offer opportunities to learn about ArcGIS, Esri Story Maps, Google Geo Tools (My Maps, Earth, and Fusion Tables), Microsoft Office (Excel, PowerPoint, Sway, and Word), NVivo, SPSS, and more. Download a flyer (landscape (PDF) & portrait (PDF)) or view workshop descriptions and register here. Continue reading

With thanks

During the 2014–15 academic year, the Libraries offered workshops on geospatial information systems software (ArcGIS), web mapping applications (Story Maps), data analysis software (Excel, NVivo, SAS, SPSS), and desktop publishing tools (InDesign, Publisher). Workshops on academic paper formatting and references in Microsoft Word were also offered, both in the classroom and online via Blackboard Collaborate.

In addition to enhancing skills, workshops offer opportunities for collaboration. I would like to recognize and extend my gratitude to the College of Education’s Dr. Sara Tomek, who partnered with the Libraries to offer a series of statistical analysis workshops, and the Department of Geography’s Dr. Steven Ericson, who led introductory and intermediate workshops on ArcGIS as well as two well-received Story Maps sessions.

Special thanks to Kim Smalley for serving as our Fall 2014 ArcGIS instructor in addition to her work in the Libraries’ Web Services department, and Cissy Xue, qualitative assistant for the College of Education’s Research Assistance Center, for teaching the Introduction to NVivo workshop in April.

New this semester: NVivo workshops

NVivo is a qualitative data analysis package used to organize and analyze data in documents, audio, video, images, spreadsheets and database tables, literature reviews and bibliographies, web pages, social media content, and more. The software allows users to work with large amounts of data in many languages and supports a wide range of research methodologies. It is available in McLure Library. Continue reading