The Project MUSE beta site offers access to over 300 free sample books. Browse and search this selection of books, along with MUSE journals, as a preview of the combined book and journal content that will be coming to MUSE on January 1, 2012. Explore books and journals on the Project MUSE beta site at http://beta.muse.jhu.edu.

Highlights of Project MUSE Beta Site

• Access to over 300 free sample books.


• New search box at the top of each page. Suggested search terms appear as you type in your search.


• Enhanced search results page showing both books and journals.


• Faceted searching. Refine search results with options to broaden or narrow results.


• Search the contents of a book and view results without leaving the book home page.


• Easy linking to content by subject area, most recently downloaded, most recently issued.


• Tiered structure for exploring subject areas.


• Enhanced Browse displays books and journals by subject area, title, or publisher.

The beta site will be available through the end of this year giving you an opportunity to become familiar with the new MUSE platform and particularly, with the new enhanced search.

You can access the sample e-books from off-campus with no authentication. To view UMBC subscriptions as well as the sample e-books from off-campus, please login via VPN first (http://vpn.umbc.edu). Click on the "UMBC Library Homepage" link, then follow the link under "News & Events" on the library homepage. For more info on remote access, see http://aok.lib.umbc.edu/services/remoteaccess.php

What: Library Basics
When: 12 Noon on Tuesday, September 6
Where: Library Room 259

This workshop aims to provide students with the basic knowledge of a university library's resources and services for helping them succeed at UMBC.

Please contact Shu Qian (qian@umbc.edu) to register.

At the conclusion of each semester the UMBC Bookstore holds an end of term textbook buyback offering students the opportunity to sell their unwanted books back to the store for cash.  In addition to the books needed on campus for the next semester the Bookstore buys books from a list of hundreds of thousands of titles that UMBC is not using, but that other schools have requested.  Managing this list is a complicated undertaking, but the Bookstore’s goal is to pay as much money as it can for as many titles as possible.

UMBC Bookstore responds to student tweet about buyback.

When one UMBC student @LindsayMiguelez tweeted that she could not sell back her brand new political science book the UMBC Bookstore staff heard her concern and went to work trying to figure out why.  After some quick research the buyback personnel determined that while the ISBN of that particular book was not in the national database to be bought back, they could in fact offer some money for it. The textbook manager immediately added the text to the buyback list and tweeted @ Lindsay to bring her book back for some cash.  In the end she may not have decided to sell that book to the Bookstore, but a lot of other students did; and the store was able to pay out more money to more students because of Lindsay’s tweet.

The UMBC Bookstore is always listening on Twitter and Facebook.

Still have books you want to turn into cash?  Stop by the next buyback:

Summer Session II Textbook Buyback:  August 18-19, 9:00 a.m – 3:30 p.m.
Back-to-School Buyback: August 29 – September 1, 9:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.,
September 2, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Visit some of the most spectacular Greek and Roman sites in the world! 

• The Greek temples of Paestum and Agrigento.  
• The Roman towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum
• The famous theater at Taormina
  
• The wonderful mosaics of a Roman villa in Sicily

The trip leaders are Richard Mason and Robert Rivkin.

This study/travel tour can be taken for winter session credit (ANCS 301).

Sign up now (by e-mailing abigail3@umbc.edu) to reserve your place on the list and receive final details as soon as they are ready.