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Government Documents Assignments: Have We Really Been There, Done That?
Cassandra Hartnett
University of Washington Libraries
Seattle, WA
Which assignments would you offer, if you were teaching? Why?
The Classic Government Documents Class
- Not always taught as a separate course
- Usually Federally focused
- Both specialist and generalist appeal
- Has practical and theoretical aspects
- Introduces students to "the documents story"
- Supplemented by high-quality handouts
Selected Textbooks Over the Years
- Boyd & Rips, United States Government Publications (1949)
- Schmeckebier & Eastin, Government Publications and Their Use (1961)
- Morehead & Fetzer, Introduction to United States Government Information Sources (1978-1994)
- Sears & Moody, Using Government Information Sources (1985, 1994)
- Robinson, Tapping the Government Grapevine (1988, 1998)
Memories of Assignments
Assignments: The Required Tasks
- Practice questions/source review
- Legislative histories
- Government agency reports
- Annotated bibliographies or "pathfinders"
- Indexing, abstracting of articles, Web sites
- Field observations
- Research
- Case studies or simulations
Assignments: The Means
- Field observations: trips to libraries, government offices, or legislative bodies
- Reading and discussion of professional literature
- Individual vs. group work
- I understand that a picture of the members of Space Shuttle Mission STS-43 is available as a government publication. Could you give me the SuDocs number so I could order it?
- The Freedman's Savings and Trust Company was established by the Federal Government in the 1860's. Which bibliography gives information explaining the official status of this banking institution, along with a list of its publications?
- Which three cities in Alabama have the highest percentage of families with yearly incomes of $50,000 or more?
Quality Assignments Should:
- Reflect graduate level work
- Combine challenge with a sense of mastery
- Increase knowledge of government
- Raise more questions than they resolve
- Require questioning and critical thinking
- Change from year to year
- Be discussed in class
- Be relevant and memorable
Areas We Should Be Emphasizing More:
- Demographic, economic, and Census sources
- Depository management/collection development
- Promoting a depository collection
- Getting involved professionally
- Collaboration (good guest speakers!)
- Comparative assignments across jurisdictions
- Bibliographic control & cataloging (PURLs)
Anonymous Quotes from GOVDOC-L Respondents
The real value to my GovDocs course was that [the instructor] continued to teach the course whenever I called him with a question during my first job... [I remember] how well he told the "documents story" and really made it interesting even though it was an 8:00 a.m. class. I guess the time meant that you really wanted to be there.
- I remember very well [the professor] talking about how our state didn't have a Regional depository and what a shame it was, etc. I really didn't get it then. But when I wound up in documents, I understood. [My library] became the Regional in 1989 due to my pushing and a willing director. So… an instructor never knows what remark will influence someone-or even how long it will take.
- One of the lasting contributions my gov docs teacher made to my professional life was the high-quality, well-organized handouts she provided to us at the beginning of each assignment… I used these handouts heavily in my days as a young librarian. I used them as check-sheets to understand my current collection, place orders, make wish lists for future large orders, and to get familiar with my collection… Fourteen years later and I still have them handy in a side drawer of my desk.
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