From the Director
Professor Ann Puckett

The staff of the UGA Law Library welcomes all new and returning law students. We hope your use of the library is pleasant and successful. It will be if you memorize the one cardinal rule of library use: if you don’t find what you want, JUST ASK! To make asking convenient, we put the Reference Desk near the entrance to the library where you can’t miss it (visual cue: foot-high all-caps sign reading REFERENCE).
It is staffed most of the hours the library is open. You can call the reference librarian on duty if you cannot come to the library in person (542-6591). All the professionals on the staff have advanced degrees in law, library science, or both. We all know
secrets about this library and about legal research that took years to learn — and we don’t charge a penny extra for teaching you our secrets.

We ask that you observe a few standards of conduct that will make using the library more pleasant for you and your classmates:

1.  Please go outside the library to eat and drink.  Food and drink residue attract insects which stay to eat the books.
2.  Please do not use tobacco in any form.  Smoking is prohibited in all UGA buildings. We also prohibit the use of smokeless tobacco in the Law Library because, well, the spitting just makes us nauseated.
3.  Please keep unnecessary noise to a minimum in study areas.  We have designated the first floor of the Annex for ultra quiet study where all talking is banned; in other areas, if you find it necessary to talk to classmates, professors, librarians, etc., in furtherance of educational purposes, do so quietly.
4.  Please re-shelve the books you use if you are certain you know where they go. Hiding or hoarding library materials is unethical conduct and could lead to disciplinary action.

All of us in the library hope you had a relaxing and productive summer. We did. Among our summer highlights was the Annual Meeting of the American Association of Law Libraries in Washington, D. C. Five librarians and Dean Shipley attended, and we all came back full of determination to make your law school experience a good one.

Returning students will probably notice fewer changes this year than in prior years, since we did not embark on any major reorganizations this summer as we have in the past. The one change you will notice will not be popular: the Law School is no longer able to provide subsidized copying to law students. The reason for that change is a state-wide budget cut and budget redirection initiative that amounts to 5% of the budgets of the Law School and the Law Library.  Every member of the law school community will feel the pinch. Faculty will no longer have their Special Research Fund to buy materials for their specialized research needs. Librarians will have reduced travel and training allowances. The Law Library will have to cancel expensive subscriptions. And law students will have to pay for copies. We are taking a look at copy costs with a view toward reducing them, so maybe you won’t feel the pinch quite as much. More on that later.

 We wish you a happy and successful year. And remember the Law Library motto: JUST ASK!

Reference Department Welcomes Francis X. Norton

The Law Library is pleased to announce that Francis X. Norton, Jr., (Fran) has accepted the new  part-time Night and Weekend Reference position in the Law Library. He will be training during the day with the Reference Librarians from August 19 - September 1. Beginning September 2, he will work at the Reference Desk Mondays and Thursdays from 5 - 9 p.m., Saturdays from noon - 5 p.m., and Sundays from 2 - 7 p.m. The remaining professional library staff will continue to rotate through the Tuesday and Wednesday evening shifts.

Many of you already know Fran from the Circulation Office, where he has worked for the past two years as a Circulation Assistant. In addition to his library experience, Fran brings seven years of experience as an attorney to this position. He earned his undergraduate degree from Notre Dame University and his J.D. from the University of Georgia School of Law. He is currently earning a Masters in Library Science from the University of South Carolina.

New Library Policy on Cell Phones & Pagers

Responding to complaints from students during Spring Semester final exams, the Law Library has instituted a new policy on Cell Phones and Pagers in the library. All cell phones and pagers must be turned off or set to vibrate or “display only” before patrons enter the Law Library. If a call or page comes in, the patron must leave the library to answer the call or page. If you have questions about this new policy, please see Sally Curtis AsKew.

Library to Interview Potential Reference Librarians

The Law Library bid a fond farewell to Associate Director José Ramón Pagés (JRP) in June. Pictures of JRP’s Retirement Party can be found on the Library’s Web site at http://www.lawsch.uga.edu/lawlib/jose/jose.html.

Post-JRP life in the Law Library has the Reference and Acquisitions librarians assuming JRP’s collection development (book-buying) duties. In his place, the Law Library will hire a new Reference/Faculty Services Librarian. At present, a nationwide search is underway for the person to fill this position (point your Web browser to http://www.lawsch.uga.edu/lawlib/webpost.html for the job description and qualifications, which include both the Juris Doctor and Masters in Library Science degrees). Five of the Law Librarians interviewed numerous candidates during the American Association of Law Libraries annual meeting last month in Washington, D.C. The Search Committee also conducted telephone interviews. We look forward to bringing several candidates to the Law School early in the semester for on-campus interviews.

Staff Focus: Alex Bernet
by Joyce Moss

[This issue’s Staff Focus column profiles Alexandra Bernet, Serials Assistant in the Acquisitions Department]

Alex Bernet, having been born in Chelsea, Staten Island, New York, can certainly be called a true New Yorker. She graduated from St. Joseph’s Academy for Girls in Chelsea. She later earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English from SUNY in Albany, New York.

Friends from SUNY convinced her to move to Athens three years ago. She began working at the Law Library July 13, 1998.

Alex has two older  brothers, Mark and Michael. Mark lives in Charlottesville, Virginia and Michael lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  Alex’s father has remained in New York City so Alex still calls New York her home. She says, “ I have a deep and unyielding love for the New York Knicks.”

Alex enjoys her work here in the Law Library. She plans to continue her education and  obtain her Masters Degree in Library Science. In her spare time she enjoys a variety of arts and crafts. Her favorite novels are contemporary fiction.  Alex is also the proud owner of a large tabby cat named “Buford.”

"Your Electronic Reality!" Law Student Listservs Will Call to You Every Day of Your Law School Experience
by JoEllen Childers

Before long, you will start receiving lots of law school e-mail messages. Some will be from administrative offices, others from your classmates, more from law student organizations, more from your professors, more, more, more. Most days, we, as the UGA legal community, exchange thousands of e-mail messages.

Everyone in the School of Law is a subscriber to a mailroom listserv. To organize and facilitate e-mail communications within the School of Law community, Law Computing Services maintains a number of listservs. A listserv is an e-mail channel connecting a group of people. Messages you send to a listserv go out to ALL persons on the list. If and when you reply to a listserv message, you choose whether to direct your message only to the sender, or, again, out to all persons on the list. Please make this choice carefully.

Law students can post messages to a listserv of classmates:  first-year students use lawstu01@uga.cc.uga.edu; second-year students use lawstu00@uga.cc.uga.edu; third-year students use lawstu99@uga.cc.uga.edu; and, LLM students use lawllm@uga.cc.uga.edu. Students may also post to all law students by sending to lawstu@uga.cc.uga.edu.

We remind you that basic netiquette, the etiquette of civil e-mail discourse, applies to all listserv communications. No one among School of Law subscribers can send messages anonymously.
 

From the Computer Lab
by Carol Watson

Lost Your Password?

We know it’s been a long summer and that many of you have too many passwords to keep up with. Here’s a quick guide to help you out.

Forgot your LEXIS id? Check at the Reference Desk.

Forgot your WESTLAW password? Check at the Reference Desk.

Forgot your ARCHES password?  Visit the ARCHES Web page at http://www.arches.uga.edu to reset or change your own ARCHES password.

Westlaw and Lexis Changes

As the new school year begins, both Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis have been making substantial changes to their systems. Watch this newsletter for further details about upcoming changes. To begin, don’t forget that you can access both research services from the web. The URLs are:

      http://lawschool.westlaw.com            http://lawschool.lexis.com
 

Westlaw
Westlaw has recently developed its new law school web page which allows you to customize Westlaw databases and access information on textbooks and study aids by course. This page also offers seamless integration with TWEN as well as “The Berring Beat,” an interactive column focusing on legal research topics and issues important to law students.

Westlaw has changed their print budget limits as follows:
1250  pages to  Stand-alone Printer    1500 pages to the Attached Printer
2000 pages to Download to Disk       2000 pages to E-mail

These limits are not that strict if you consider that you can combine your print options. For example, if you are reaching your limit on the stand-alone printer, switch to another delivery option such as downloading to disk or e-mailing documents to yourself.

If you are not accessing Westlaw via their web page, you will be interested to learn that Westlaw has released version 7.2 of their Westmate software. Westlaw has also developed a new version of its citechecking software, WestCheck. With WestCheck 4.0, you can extract and run your citations list from one place — your Microsoft Word 97 document. You can download Westmate or WestCheck from the Westlaw web page or obtain the software from the Library Legal Research lab.

Lexis-Nexis
Remember that as of July 1st,  Lexis-Nexis now has Shepard’s online exclusively. Lexis-Nexis has improved its online Shepard’s by incorporating the history from the Auto-Cite service, along with unique citing references from both the Auto-Cite service and the LEXCITE feature, into one report.

Lexis has also released CheckCite 2000. The CheckCite 2000 program reads your word processing document (such as a list of citations, a brief or memo or any document with legal citations), automatically connects with Lexis-Nexis web-based research and creates a report that verifies your citations using: the new Shepard’s Citations Service, the Auto-Cite Service, QuoteCheck, and the Full Text feature. You can download CheckCite 2000 from the Lexis-Nexis web page or pick up a copy of the software in the Library Legal Research Lab.

Lexis-Nexis is about to revamp their web page and add many new search features. By the time you read this article, many of these changes will take place. Watch next month’s newsletter for further details.

Computer Lab Help Desk
by JoEllen Childers

We are, all of us, extremely fortunate to have a help desk staffed by computer science and management information systems undergraduates. We give these folks terrible, meager pay, and, in exchange, year after year, they afford us a generally remarkable level of technical skill. Because the benefits of this exchange accrue so one-sidedly in favor of the law school, we cannot tolerate anyone, but anyone, disrespecting these staffers. Help desk staff also provide direct assistance to all faculty and staff at the law school.

Early this academic year, the help desk will be staffed 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. As we can attract more qualified students and budget the hours, our coverage will expand, first, to weekends, then, in to weekday evenings.

In addition to direct support in the labs, questions may be submitted to the help desk via e-mail (lawhelp@listserv.uga.edu) or phone (542-0895).

AALL Joins Nolo Press in Texas Lawsuit

The American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) has joined Nolo Press in filing a lawsuit against the Texas Unauthorized Practice of  Law Committee (UPLC) in Texas state court. The lawsuit seeks a judicial declaration whether Nolo, bookstores, and libraries can continue to sell and distribute Nolo publications in the state.

The lawsuit is an outgrowth of Nolo’s recent struggles with a subcommittee of the UPLC, which is investigating whether Nolo may distribute its materials under the Texas unauthorized practice of law statute. The lawsuit also follows on the heels of a recent decision in which a Texas federal district court enjoined the sale in Texas of Quicken Family Lawyer, a computer program that automates the task of preparing legal forms.

Berkeley, California-based Nolo Press has been the leading publisher of self-help law books and software in the U.S. since 1971. Nolo Press publishes more than 120 titles — books, software, legal forms, audio and video tapes — and has over five million copies in print.

 “Every librarian who serves the public uses Nolo Press and other self-help materials to assist those who want to do their own legal research. In my experience, Nolo materials are exceptionally clear and help to answer many common questions,” said Keith Ann Stiverson, a member of AALL and Deputy Law Librarian at the School of Law of the University of Texas at Austin. “These materials are an essential part of public library and law library collections in Texas, and the public would be poorly served without them.”

James Heller (Director of the Law Library and Professor of Law, College of William and Mary, Marshall-Wythe Law Library, Williamsburg, Virginia), past-President of the American Association of  Law Libraries, maintains that “this is an important issue that goes to the essence of our association: the dissemination of, and access to, information. It’s most appropriate that AALL should take a strong stand.”

In addition to Nolo and AALL, the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit are the Texas Library Association and six other Texas citizens who are Nolo customers or who rely on borrowing Nolo publications from libraries.

The American Association of Law Libraries was founded in 1906 to promote and enhance the value of law libraries to the legal and public communities, to foster the profession of law librarianship, and to provide leadership in the field of legal information. Today, with over 4,800     members, and nearly 220 members in the state of Texas, the Association represents law librarians and related professionals who are affiliated with a wide range of institutions: law firms; law schools; corporate legal departments; courts; and local, state, and federal government  agencies. For more information, visit http://www.nolo.com/texas/index.html or AALLNET, the official AALL Web site, at http://www.aallnet.org.

Herty Field Undergoes Major Renovation
by Joyce Moss

From the late 1800’s, Herty Field has been a landmark on the University of Georgia North Campus. More than one hundred years ago, 24-year old University of Georgia chemistry professor Dr. Charles Herty, introduced  the sport of football to his alma mater. He had become fascinated with the game as a graduate student at Johns Hopkins. When he returned to the University as a member of the faculty in the Fall of 1891,  Herty walked out across an old field where students often participated in unorganized recreation. The field rested in a  quadrangle bordered by campus buildings, most specifically New College on one side and Moore College on one end, with the Chapel on a corner.

He told the students about the game he had seen in the East. He helped them prepare a field on the quadrangle which would be named for Dr. Herty a few days later.

Over the next few months, a great tradition was born. On January 25, 1892, Georgia played Mercer College on Herty Field. Football in the South had begun.

Over the years football grew and Herty Field was replaced with Sanford Stadium. Eventually Herty was paved and became a parking lot. Now it is being renovated as part of the UGA master plan. It will once again become “green space” complete with walks, shade trees and a fountain.
Framed by Moore College, Candler Hall, the Alexander Campbell King Law Library and New College, the proposed Herty quad will have aesthetics similar to what you see of North Campus when you look through the Arch.