by Arthur Wilson, fact checker

AP English Literature teacher Ms. Sackstein coordinated a trip to instruct her class in how to conduct library research, a skill that becomes immensely helpful once they go to college.

On October 23rd, a class of seniors spent a day at the Queensborough Community College library to learn about different resources they have available to narrow down their searches in completion of college level work.

“Overall I really wanted to give my students an opportunity to see what it is really like to sit through a college lecture. I think it’s important to expose them to academic research,” Ms. Sackstein said.

Unlike most school trips, students were expected to arrive and depart from the library at their own initiative. Students spent an entire school day there completing work with the help of the numerous tools the library offered, such as free access to databases in the QCC Library website and books on various subjects.

Students were prompted to utilize these resource to their advantage in the completion of a project on satire, which will require MLA citations and proper articles obtained from a scholarly source to provide reasoning behind the satirical humor.

“I think it is important to be able to navigate a library, and information literacy classes are an important introduction to that. With knowledge of the citation formats and how to use the databases, students will be able to have an understanding of how to do research,” QCC librarian Ms. Skir said.

Ms. Sackstein has planned a second trip to a four year university, Queens College next spring, when students will conduct a few days’ worth of research for their final project in the AP class.

“I’m interested in going again. I still have a little bit of trouble finding specific information and I would like to learn more about how the boolean databases work,” senior Emmanuel Damanakis said.