POWER library Databases for Research

POWER Library

POWER Library is a group of databases provided to library card holders for free. They are safe, educationally-appropriate sources of information. You need your library card number to use most of them.

Some databases are for younger students. Some are for adults. Some are for middle and high school students. Which ones you use depends on two things usually:

  1. Your reading ability
  2. What information you are searching for

Go to the YCL homepage.   http://www.yorklibraries.org

Go to What Can I Do? 

Choose for researchers from the menu that appears

The databases are listed here along with other resources you might want to use. 

Let’s review a few.

AP Images has photographs from all around the world, taken for publication in major newspapers (AP is Associated Press). It is in the “For Adults” section of the “For Researchers “ page.

Contemporary Authors has biographies of current famous authors.  

 Elementary Student Research allows you to search by subject but has a search bar in the subject areas too.

Middle School Student Research is more detailed and on a higher reading level than Elementary Student Research, but you should use it in MYP year and early high school.

Primary Search Main Edition  is great for magazine articles from 1990 to the present.

Middle Search Main Edition is a bit harder than the Middle School Student Research or Elementary Student Research. It gives a more advanced search capability, similar to the advanced search part in our card catalog.

Science Reference Center is also on a higher reading level than the 2 student research databases. It will be great in MYP and DP studies. It is in the “For Adults” section of the “For Researchers “ page.

SIRS Discoverer is a general reference center. 

Remember to create a Works Cited page or slide to list your sources. Many of the articles in these databases have a link somewhere along the side or bottom of the article that allows you to go to the full citation for the article. We use MLA style.  You can copy and paste the citation or hand copy it to your work. If you hand copy, proofread for spelling, punctuation, and spacing. It all has to be correct.

You can also go to EasyBib, BibMe, or Citation Machine to do your citations. MLA style, choose your medium, and use manual entry mode. If it is a website or image, there might be a place on the manual entry page to click a check-box so the website address (URL) appears in the citation. Use it!  You need the web address (URL) in your citation.