Cornell Law Library Highlights and Accomplishments July 1996-June 1997
Faculty Services. Active liaison program for personal service, including one-on-one training for online services. Fifteen faculty now use new SmartCILP (Current Index to Legal Periodicals), providing weekly e-mail delivery of latest journal article citations on customized subjects. Student Services. Intensive training program for law students; 40 sessions taught to a total of 800 students, on topics including legal research overview for small section memo, Bridge the Gap series on litigation and corporation law research, Web instruction, Bear Access, immigration, judicial clerkships, job searching, European Union law, international and foreign law. Orientation programs for first year ' students, LL.M.s, Academic orientation, law review staffs, CUL librarians, and Admitted Students’ program. These training programs are complemented by displays in various parts of the library, and a large number of library publications, in print and on the Web (see separate list). Includes new brochure on Cornell Law Library: A History. Legal Research Course (PT1). Semester long credit course taught by Pat Court, Scott Childs, John Hasko, and Jean Wenger. This year, class sessions held in small individual sections led to more effective teaching. Includes components taught by the Legal Information Institute and the Practionerin-Residence. Advisory Council Presentation. Presentation at Law School Advisory Council Meeting on “Legal Research and Law Office Management in the 21st Century,” September 1996. Claire Germain talked about the future of legal information and law library Web initiatives to build the electronic library. Presentation followed by library staff “Surfing the Net” hands-on session, taught by Pat Court, Scott Childs, John Hasko, Jean Pajerek, and Jean Wenger New University Librarian. The new University Librarian, Sarah Thomas, visited the law library and joined an all staff meeting, on October 22,1996. Unveiling of Library Web Site at Open House. A major event of the fall was the Library Open House and unveiling of the new Library Web Site in October 1996. About 300 students, faculty and staff participated. Computers and a projection screen were installed in library reading room alcoves. See write-up in the student newspaper, The Tower (November 7, 1996, at 6-7). ►
International Court of Justice, the decisions of the World Court are now available on the Internet for the first time, thanks to the Law Library’s efforts, in English and French, together with a number of related useful information (pictures of judges, research guide, press releases, etc.). Claire Germain and Jay Greco presented the Web site at the April 1997 ASIL (American Society of International Law) meeting in Washington, D.C.
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Other Web initiatives: the State Law Project presents a comprehensive picture of state primary sources in all formats, from the Internet to print; the Legal Research Encyclopedia builds on inSITE annotations of Web sites and consists of mini-guides, integrating resources in a variety of formats (books, cd-roms, Lexis, Westlaw, Internet, videotapes, etc.), arranged by subject and jurisdiction, with direct hypertext links to as many electronic sources as possible. Development currently incorporated into daily work of reference librarians. These projects are the result of the Law Library’ efforts to move to a greater reliance on networked electronic resources and show researchers how they can integrate print and electronic research sources.
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Death Penalty Web Site. Developed with other law school units (see below).