OKU Reference Services Division
Cornell University Library

http://www.library.cornell.edu/olinuris/ref/govdocjf.html


Government Documents: A Guide for Junior Fellows


 The government has information about your neighborhood.

Orthoimagery for Rensselaer County is 2 ft resolution panchromatic in rural areas and 1 ft resolution natural color in urban areas.

What is a Government Document?

Information is published by the United States Government on the Web, on CD-ROM, in microform, and in printed volumes. The governments of all other countries of the world also publish documents. International and trans-national quasi-governmental organizations also publish documents: the United Nations and the European Union, for instance.

State, provincial, and local governments also publish documents.

What can you find out about your neighborhood using:

You're a reference librarian. For a civil engineering professor, find photos of the Interstate 40 bridge collapse earlier this year in Oklahoma:

A student wants to know the population of Ithaca city. Find 2000 census population of the City of Ithaca:

Are there more males or females in the City of Ithaca according to the 2000 Census?

Does this information on the Web qualify as a government document? Use your critical evaluation skills to identify the source of the information you find.

Librarians create Web sites to help researchers and students find government documents.
Here are three examples created at Cornell:

Careers

Some librarians specialize in acquiring and organizing government documents and information published by governments. The University of Michigan has a Web site about documents librarians. Look at the Job Postings section to find out more about documents librarianship.

OKU Reference Services Division
Cornell University Library

24 July 2002
Michael Engle, moe1@cornell.edu
Information Services Division, IRIS,
Cornell University Library
URL: http://www.library.cornell.edu/olinuris/ref/govdocjf.html


Olin and Uris Libraries, Cornell University, Ithaca NY 14853
Information and reference: 607-255-4144, okuref@cornell.edu
Circulation: (Olin) 607-255-4245, (Uris) 607-255-3537, okucirc@cornell.edu