Welcome to the Zondervan Library!
While the Library may seem like a quiet, placid place, there is a
lot of change afoot. To some degree that has always been true of
libraries: books and resources added, circulated, withdrawn, and
replaced.
Today the rate of change for libraries is unprecedented and that’s the case here in the Zondervan Library. For several years we've been adding more than 3,000 new books, DVDs, and CDs, each year, but we've been acquiring other resources – like periodicals and eBooks -- at a greater rate.
While the Zondervan Library's physical holdings approach 200,000
items, we now have online access to more than 25,000 full-text
periodicals which represents an increase of about 500% over the past
five years. The Zondervan Library provides far more information than
what you see on its shelves.
The Library's newly revised Web site provides a place to start with links to the Online Catalog and WorldCat, select periodical and newspaper resources, and important computerized reference resources (such as CREDO Reference and the Oxford English Dictionary).
It would be great if everything to which we have access could be
searched in one place, but that’s not yet possible. Though frequently
and falsely presumed, it is not possible to find "everything" through
Google or Google Scholar, even though both can be useful for locating
various kinds of information.
The Zondervan Library’s Catalog is the place to start for finding what's within its walls and to discover resources that are available electronically and in the Taylor University Fort Wayne library. There are over eighty "Research Databases" that uncover the contents of thousands of periodicals, many of which are available full-text. An addition to the Library's arsenal is a set of Research Guides, one for each discipline, that were developed to provide students with a starting point for their information inquiries. Each guide offers reference materials, databases, journals, as well as free web resources identified by librarians for that particular field of study.
While we hope that the Library's Web site will be a useful guide, it is selective. It's only a partial view of the resources available to you. We provide access to, plus introduction and instruction about, many other information resources and strategies.
Our most valuable resource, however, is the Library staff. We are here to help you navigate the tools that you find from the Web site but also from many other sources. We strive to be available in a variety of ways: from assistance in person at the Reference Desk, via the telephone (8-HELP / 84357), or by e-mail through Ask-A-Librarian. Please don't hesitate to contact us.
The Library’s resources are meant to be used and to support your learning experience. We’re ready to help. Whether we meet you in person, "digitally," or over the phone, our goal is to meet you as a person made in God's image to whom we want to provide the best service possible.