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Request Course Resources for Fall 2025

Tue, July 8, 2025 2:10 PM

Do you need to make supplemental course materials available to your students?

Course resources is a service the Library offers to make course-related materials available to your students. Print materials can be made available at the Library for a 2-hour loan period upon request. 

Would you like to make video materials available to your students?

The Library offers digitation services for AV materials, including eligible DVDs. Video content digitized by the Library is made available in CatCourses through the Kaltura Canvas tool. 

Requests can be submitted at any time and will be processed in the order they are received. For more information and to submit a request, see our Course Resources guide. 

Access Alert - UC Library Search

Thu, July 3, 2025 10:40 AM
Author: 
Sarah Sheets

On Sunday, July 6th from midnight to 1am Pacific Time, our vendor ExLibris will be performing systems maintenance. This may interrupt your ability to use UC Library Search.  We apologize for any inconvenience and hope this interruption will be minimally disruptive.

Share Your Story - Former UC Merced Library Student Assistants

Sat, June 28, 2025 9:25 AM

As a former UC Merced Library student assistant, you have been an essential part of our story!

This fall, we’re launching an exhibit in celebration of the UC Merced Library’s 20th Anniversary and would love to highlight the experiences of Library Student Assistant alum. Your reflections would contribute to this celebration of the Library and our larger campus. 

To participate, we invite you to respond to one of the following questions via our online form by July 16, 2025. Your response will be integrated into the Library’s Exhibit. 

  • What made your time working at the UC Merced Library meaningful or memorable? 
  • How did your UC Merced Library work experience influence your college journey or career path? 
  • Is there a particular moment, skill, or story that stands out from your time with us? 
  • What did you enjoy most about the Library?

Thank you for being part of our story. We can’t wait to hear yours! 

Please direct any questions to Sara Davidson Squibb (sdavidson2@ucmerced.edu).

With appreciation, 

Sara for the 20th Anniversary Exhibits Committee, UC Merced Library 

Image of Kolligian Library building reflecting in the canal. Reflecting on 20 Years is in white script at the top of the photo.

Library Partners with Summer Undergraduate Research Institute

Mon, June 23, 2025 1:45 PM

On Monday June 3, the Library, in support of UC Merced's Undergraduate Research Opportunities Center (UROC) hosted this year's cohort of the Summer Undergraduate Research Institute (SURI). 

Students were given the choice of attending sessions with our Librarians and Library staff. Associate University Librarian for Research & Engagement, Sara Davidson Squibb led sessions on, "Finding Sources through Citation Networks (aka Scholarship is Connected)." Head of Research and Learning Services Librarian, Bronwen Maxson guided students through "Using Zotero to Manage Your Research & Cite Sources," and "AI Tools for Research." Instruction & Research Librarian, Elizabeth McMunn-Tetangco also guided students through "Using Zotero to Manage Your Research & Cite Sources," as well as, "Get to Know Scholarly Publishing!" Research and Learning Librarian, Joe Ameen led sessions on "File Management and Research: Keeping Everything Organized," and "Exploring & Finding STEM Research." Instruction & Outreach Librarian, Olivia Olivares taught, "Be a Social Success! Social Sciences Databases & Resources." Night & Weekend Services Coordinator, Isabel Ramos conducted Library tours throughout the morning, and Learning Services Coordinator, Paulina Allende offered sessions on "Library Basics." 

To learn more about these topics, and learn more about how the UC Merced Library contributes to student success, contact us or come and visit us!

A huge thank you to our Librarians and Library staff for their continued dedication to supporting our students.

Isabel Ramos leading library tours on June 3, 2025

Sara Davidson Squibb leading a library workshop on June 3, 2025.

Joe Ameen leading a library workshop on June 3, 2025.

 

 

Open Access Publishing Options with American Chemical Society Changing July 1

Tue, June 10, 2025 4:20 PM

Beginning July 1, 2025, open access publishing options with the American Chemical Society (ACS) for UC authors are changing. Authors who wish to publish under an open access license on the ACS platform will be responsible for covering the full cost of the discounted Article Processing Charge (APC). This change is due to a number of factors, including high publishing volume and lower-than-anticipated contribution of research funding, which have made the current agreement with ACS unsustainable.  The option for authors without available research funding to request full coverage of the APC will end on June 30, 2025. 
 
Authors who are publishing in subscription/hybrid ACS journals may opt out of open access and publish behind a paywall at no additional cost.
 
Reading access to ACS journals will continue without interruption, essentially reverting to the type of agreement UC had with ACS prior to the open access publishing agreement that began in May 2022.
 
Why this decision was made: 
 
Cost containment has always been a top priority for UC’s open access agreements. The current agreement with ACS was built on the assumption that if UC authors with research funds available to pay the open access publication fee could help to shoulder their costs, the library could stretch its limited financial resources to make open access publication an option for those authors without available funds. Unfortunately, the percentage of authors contributing research funds toward APCs has decreased to levels well below those of UC’s other agreements operating on a similar principle. The resulting cost increases to the libraries under the model are proving to be unsustainable and we have been unable to find an alternate pathway with ACS that would sustain a UC-supported open access publishing option.
 
In fall 2024, UC launched an outreach campaign to better understand authors’ decision-making processes when choosing whether and how to publish open access with ACS. Direct outreach was conducted via email to 806 UC authors who 1) published OA in ACS journals but did not contribute grant funds towards the OA fees and 2) opted out of open access altogether. A link to a survey where authors could provide feedback was included in the outreach. The survey did not result in any change in open access uptake or grant participation, and its findings helped inform the decision to revise the open access publishing option with ACS.
 
How this change will affect UC researchers: 
 
•    Reading access to ACS publications will continue without interruption.
•    Authors who publish in ACS journals will still be able to make their articles open access, but starting July 1, 2025, full funding support will no longer be available through the UC libraries. Authors will be responsible for covering a single, discounted article processing charge (APC) of $3,000. As always, authors also have the option to deposit their pre-publication, peer-reviewed author accepted manuscript in an open access repository like arXiv or UC’s eScholarship for free.
 
UC’s open access agreements with other publishers are also unaffected. In fact, author participation rates for UC’s other open access agreements are generally much stronger than in this instance. For researchers who publish in journals covered under these other agreements, open access funding support continues to be available from the UC libraries and we encourage authors to take advantage of it.
 
For questions about this change with ACS, or about open access publishing options at UC in general, please don’t hesitate to reach out to Jerrold Shiroma (jshiroma@ucmerced.edu).
 

Access Alert - UC Library Search

Thu, June 5, 2025 10:05 AM
Author: 
Sarah Sheets

On Sunday, June 8th from midnight to 1am Pacific Time, our vendor ExLibris will be performing systems maintenance. This may interrupt your ability to use UC Library Search.  We apologize for any inconvenience and hope this interruption will be minimally disruptive.

BrowZine -- Resource Access Ending

Tue, June 3, 2025 4:10 PM
Author: 
Elizabeth McMunn-Tetangco

Decorative: Access Alert: BrowZine

Due to ongoing budget cuts, the UC Merced Library will be canceling our subscription to BrowZine, and its browser extension, LibKey Nomad, effective July 1, 2025.

UC Merced began subscribing to BrowZine in 2021. BrowZine allows users to create lists of articles to read and to track new material in selected journals through app notifications. It also integrates with RefWorks, EndNote, and Mendeley.

Our decision to cancel was not taken lightly; the current budget situation has necessitated cuts to resources that have been valuable to Library users.

Please reach out to us with any questions at library@ucmerced.edu. 

Kyahra Lingatong Wins Library Sticker Contest

Fri, May 23, 2025 9:15 AM
Author: 
Paulina Allende

On April 2, 2025, the Library launched a sticker contest across our campus community, open to all undergraduate students. 

In honor of our resident Columbian mammoths, we looked for designs depicting two mammoths - an adult and a juvenile. We also required for the design to incorporate the text, "Empowering Researchers" and "library.ucmerced.edu" into the design. In addition to the two mammoths, we also asked for designs to include a landscape background inspired by the beauty of our neighboring Yosemite National Park or the Sierra Nevada. 

Within our one-month deadline, we received thousands of views on our Instagram post, and seven incredible submissions from UC Merced students.

A library panel composed of 19 library staff voted on the seven submissions and came up with our top three designs. We asked for our campus community to vote via Instagram for the winning design. In collaboration with our campus partners, who shared our post 155 times across Instagram, we received 253 votes from Instagram users to decide on the winning submission. With 49% of the votes, Kyahra Lingatong's creative design was crowned winner.

Kyahra is a first year Public Health major at UC Merced. She is originally from Roseville, California. As part of her submission, she shared the following about her design, "My process in making the design consisted of using real examples of Colombian mammoths, making sure the juvenile and adult design was simplified, yet also accurate. I had a lot of fun with the background going for a lineless Yosemite Park background using an image of Half Dome as my guide. The colors were also based on sunset, warm colors (they) are inviting and comforting to look at, making the design more coherent. The applications I used included Google (for inspiration) and I drew it all digitally on Procreate." 

Kyahra also shared with us, "Fun fact about the process is that I mistakenly drew the Colombian mammoth for the wooly species at first and it wasn't until I was done with the draft that I realized I was drawing the wrong one. Luckily that was fixed! But, in all seriousness, I am happy to be a part of this in creating representation to Merced's prehistoric past and honoring our researchers. I was able to learn more about the background and history of these fossils that we're so lucky to have on our campus. Thank you again for letting me be a part of this!" 

Congratulations to Kyahra for her winning submission! Our new Library stickers will be sent to be printed during the summer in time to be distributed at Library events during the Fall 2025 semester. 

UC Merced Library Welcomes Sang Park as our Technical Services Coordinator

Thu, May 22, 2025 10:45 AM

Sang Park was one of the founding staff members of UC Merced and re-joined library as the Technical Services Coordinator in April. He spent the last 18 years heading up a research library for the Navy. Prior to joining UC Merced the first time, he worked in the library at NASA Ames Research Center, UCSF, San Francisco City College, and San Diego State University.  

What interested you in this position? 

To be honest, the main thing that interested me was being able to actually do some library work. After spending most of my time in my previous position in management, supervising librarians and library technicians, I am really looking forward to library duties and fewer responsibilities. Plus, I already own a house nearby. 

What is something that you’re looking to accomplish in your new role? 

Cataloging is probably where I have the least experience within a library. I’m hoping to get up to speed quickly and make it one of my strongest skills. I’m also hoping to quickly make a big dent in the current backlog of donations.  

What are some of your favorite things to do in your free time? 

I love traveling and spending time in nature. I especially enjoy hiking and scuba diving. I’ve always loved traveling, and at some point in my life, I transitioned to adventure travel.  

My last trip was through South Africa, Madagascar, and Mauritius. I was able to go on two safaris, and I was hoping to be able to dive with some Whale Sharks off the coast of Madagascar, but the weather conditions were not optimal. So, I ended up visiting the Island of Lemurs instead. 

Some of my more memorable trips were driving around different parts of Spain that included participating in the running of the bulls, diving down the Big Blue Hole in Belize, and doing the Mt. Everest trek in Nepal. 

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Help us give Sang a warm welcome back to UC Merced!

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