Want to Organize Your Research? You Can “Account” on Us!

Rice Library databases and the Online Catalog do more than just search indexed articles and catalogued books. For instance, did you know:

• that with EBSCOHost, ProQuest, and JStor, you can set up accounts to save your articles and searches?
• you can manage your Rice Library Catalog account anytime, anywhere online?
• that articles, books, and other items held at libraries from all over Indiana and the United States are just a few clicks from being on their way to you?

If you are able to answer “yes” to all of the questions above, well done! You should hereby consider yourself an honorary librarian!

If your answer was “no” to any or all of the questions above, read on! (Read on anyway!) : )

Each of the above-mentioned database vendors provide their users with account-creating capabilities. Creating an account with each is free and takes just a few moments. Typically, the accounts ask for you to create a username, password, and provide some contact information. Once you have created an account, you can create research folders and/or save articles. Each database vendor offers their account capabilities a little differently, but all allow users to save articles.

Of course, if a user prefers not to create an account but still wants to take action on a number of articles found in a single session, they may do so by selecting each article according to the database procedure, then clicking on the print, email, or save icons from the saved “folder view” or “my research” link.  For additional information on ways to utilize EbscoHost for your research, please see the posting below entitled, “Oh, The Research You Can Do With EBSCOhost!”  You may also want to visit the EBSCOHost LibGuide.

If, like many of us, you have ever forgotten your due date for your library books and want to check what it is, or if you want to renew your items from home, you can do both. Here is how:

1. In the top-right corner of the Rice Library online catalog, click on “Login to your Library Account.”

2. Your ID is the 14 digits on the back of your Eagle Access Card, beginning with the numbers 292.

3. Type in your last name.

4. Click on the “My Account” tab.

5. From this page, you can review all the items you have checked out with Rice Library, plus renew any items not already overdue, modify your profile information and arrange any searching preferences you might have.

6. Like the databases above, users can, without logging in, print, export, and/or email selected titles searched in any given session.

Finally, we encourage you to sign up for an Interlibrary Loan account.  You may do so by locating the "Interlibrary Loan" drop-down menu on the Rice Library home page.  From the drop-down menu, click on "ILLiad Logon;" you use your MyUSI username and password.  Once you fill out a profile page, you are eligible to request articles not available in full text from our databases, and books not in the Rice Library collection.  This opens up literally every library in Indiana, and collections from all across the United States.  To learn more about Interlibrary Loan, please visit the Interlibrary Loan LibGuide and watch the brief tutorial.

Be sure to write your account user/password information down somewhere safe and handy, then visit your saved information anytime, anywhere, at your convenience. To learn more about these and other valuable resources, please visit our Research 101 LibGuide, or ask a Rice Library Reference Librarian.

BR