LIBE 467: Post 8

While subscription-based online databases available to students through their school's library tend to be one of the best resources for authoritative content, another praise-worthy--and absolutely free and easily accessible--resource is the Internet Public Library (IPL).

IPL describes itself thusly:

ipl2 is a public service organization and a learning/teaching environment. To date, thousands of students and volunteer library and information science professionals have been involved in answering reference questions for our Ask an ipl2 Librarian service and in designing, building, creating and maintaining the ipl2's collections. It is through the efforts of these students and volunteers that the ipl2 continues to thrive to this day.

Similar to Open Access (OA) and Open Journal Systems (OJS) (which I discuss in another blog), the IPL exists as a great first-choice online database for students to refer to when researching. Available by simply visiting the site from any computer (as opposed to perhaps using passwords to log into a school library's fee-based subscription database), the IPL describes itself as featuring "Information You Can Trust" and should be a first-look resource for teachers of all subjects in the secondary education world. My English students are regularly directed to it for information on such topics as author biographies, literature by time period, and schools of literary criticism.

While not meant to take the place of subscription-based online databases offered by such companies as Gale and EBSCO, the IPL does stand out as a reference source that offers a refuge of quality, authoritative information in the midst of the big world wide web of information on the Internet.