Help understanding the financial crisis

Has the complicated financial news lately got you scratching your head? Need some help telling TARP from ARRA from FDIC?

Some industrious librarians offer these well-organized collections of reliable, authoritative links to helpful information on the subject. Louise Feldmann, at Colorado State University, has made this comprehensive guide available. Jason Phillips, a reference librarian at Mississippi State is working on another extensive guide, which even includes links audio and video resources. (Note that not all sub-topics have content yet.) Speaking of which, here is National Public Radio's Economy page, which provides access to many of their news stories and analysis programs. And another Colorado library, the Jefferson County Public Library in Lakewood, has put together this page on the crisis.

In addition to these library projects, the Federal Reserve branch in St. Louis, which provides oodles of good economic data in the best of times, too, has developed this Financial Crisis Timeline. The site also includes links to analytical papers and reports, data, and a handy FAQ.

The financial news might be gloomy, but it's always better to know more about a problem than just to ignore it and hope it goes away. We hope these links will help!

Women's History Month 2009 - Saving the Planet

Women’s History Month is a time for us to reflect on the accomplishments of women and the continuing challenges facing women in our world. The national theme for this March is “Women Taking the Lead to Save Our Planet” which highlights the ways in which women having contributed to environmental awareness, sustainability, and the green movement. St. Mary’s University’s Women’s History Month Planning Committee will be presenting several public programs inspired by the national theme. For more information about campus programming, check out the St. Mary’s Women’s History Month page and the March 2009 program brochure.
The Blume Library’s March book display offers books demonstrating women’s contributions to identifying and solving the most difficult problems in our natural world. For example, Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, arguably the book that started the environmental movement, is just one of the great works on display. All display books are available for checkout. Take this opportunity to learn about women’s contributions to environmental awareness!

If you are looking for online material, several websites offer information, and fun facts, about women’s history. The U.S. Department of State highlights the 2009 national theme on the department’s Women’s History Month pages. More information about Women’s History Month, and research collections relating to women’s history, can be found on the Library of Congress’ Women’s History Month site. The U.S. Census Bureau posts a Women’s History Month feature each year that gives some current statistics about women. An example of the 2009 data includes that fact that “28.2 million women 25 and older with a bachelor’s degree or more education in 2007, more than double the number 20 years earlier.” Obviously, women continue to take advantage of the educational and career opportunities available to them thanks to the efforts of equal rights activists of the past and present.

For something on the lighter side, quiz yourself about women’s history. There are several online quizzes that are fun but also let you know how well you know women’s history. About.com offers a great Women’s History Month website with a related quiz. Or, try the quiz on the National Women’s History Month Project site. While your there, take one last opportunity to reflect on the national theme by reading a few biographies of contemporary women who are working to save our planet.


~Necia Wolff

(Beautiful "Love Your Mother" photograph courtesy of Cayusa on Flickr.com. Photo listed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 Generic license.)