I have always found that science students are more lazy than others when
it comes to going to the library. Perhaps students in history or
English are more lazy than they used to be, but my experience is that
history students, for example, view the library as one of their
"laboratories." That's one of the places they go to do history.
Science students, on the other hand, don't view the library as a place
to do science.
An example is my annual experiment of using a long pendulum to find the
local value for g. Students find experimentally that g for Bluffton, OH
is 9.803 m/s^2, and I tell them they have to compare that to the
established value of g for Bluffton. This drives them nuts.
First I tell them that the United States Geological Survey has measured
g in Bluffton on several occasions and at several locations. I tell
them these results are published, in hard copy, by USGS. They then ask
how they can find this publication. I ask them where they would
normally go to find published material. Believe it or not, it takes a
while for them to think of the library.
Then, after a very disgruntled visit to the college library, they come
back and tell me it isn't there. I tell them that the Bluffton College
Library is a US depository library, and if USGS publications are not
there then maybe they ought to inform the library staff. "In fact," I
add, "didn't they already realize something was wrong when you asked
them for help and they couldn't find it either?" Of course, the
students hadn't even thought of asking, or were too embarrassed to ask,
the library staff to help them find the USGS data.
I've been doing this for 25 years. Before the Internet students
complained, "If this is something we need in science, why don't you just
get the USGS report and keep it in the physics lab where we can find
it." Today they ask, "Can't we get that number from the Internet?"
I've given a long response. The short response is, yes... Students are
incredibly lazy, especially if you try to make them go someplace outside
of their normal routine, and even more that place intimidates them.
Stand your ground.
Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D.
Professor of Chemistry and Physics
Bluffton College
Bluffton, OH 45817
(419)-358-3270
edmiston@bluffton.edu
This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.