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Reference Menu Organization

Innovative Web-Based Reference Services:
A Selected List

Local Systems and Services Committee

"Reference Menu" refers to how libraries organize and display their electronic, and sometimes their print, reference sources. The reference sources which are organized on these sites include the more traditional library reference sources (dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs, indexes, etc.) along with city, state, national and commercial informational and reference-like Internet sites. Some libraries also include more specialized subject sources on the Reference Menu page. The following sites have been chosen for the imaginative and user-friendly ways in which their menus are organized and/or designed. These sites represent some of the best ideas in reference menu design in use by libraries.

Institution: Morton Grove Public Library
Title: Webrary Links Menu
URL: http://www.webrary.org/ref/weblinksmenu.html
Contact: Web Team, Kevin Justie, Webmaster: mailto:kjustie@webrary.org
Description: This web sites is organized by Dewey numbers and includes simple explanations of the meanings of the numbers to assist in selection. Within each broad range of number, subcategories are given. This site provides access to hundreds of carefully selected web sites. Also included are a brief explanation of why this method was chosen and several caveats about the web sites included in these pages. The page also provides well-placed, consistent links to other parts of the library's web site, including a search engine for Webrary. Also included are links to four specialized pages: kids links, business, genealogy and travel resources.
Why it's innovative: The use of the Dewey classification to organize the web links is innovative and a great way to teach and reinforce the meaning of the Dewey system. This site also has a search box. So, for example, if someone doesn't know where encyclopedias fit into the Dewey numbers, the word encyclopedia can be searched and all different kinds of encyclopedias will be retrieved.
Initially reviewed: May 2000, Re-reviewed: June 2003

Institution: King County Library System
Title: Homework Help
URL: http://www.kcls.org/hh/homework.cfm
Contact: Lisa Hill: lhill@kcls.org
Description: Homework Help, from King County Library, is a reference menu for students in grades 4 through 12, with categories including general resources, dictionaries, encyclopedias & almanacs, careers, social issues and many more. This is an attractive page that links to both subscription databases, like Encyclopedia Britannica, and to free web pages. For each free web site, a description of each that page including authorship in included. This site has obviously taken great effort to select a variety of appropriate web sites on each topic for its intended audience.
Why it's innovative: The page uses graphics in an appealing way. The creation of the page follows the Web Linking Guidelines created by the King County Library System (see http://www.kcls.org/about/weblink.cfm), which discuss navigation, content, authority, and accessibility of sites.
Reviewed: June 2003

Institution: University of Washington Library
Title: Reference Tools
URL: http://www.lib.washington.edu/research/reftools.htmlhttp://www.lib.washington.edu/research/reftools.html
Contact: Theresa Mudrock: mudrock@u.washington.edu
Description: This reference site was created with the users in mind. User queries on the previous reference tools site from this library were reviewed and analyzed. Based on the analysis of user searching behavior, the categories of information on the Reference Tools site were selected and terminology was changed. Also added were quick links to the most frequently used sources: a dictionary, an encyclopedia and a thesaurus. To learn more about how this site was designed see: Mudrock, T. (2002). Revising Ready Reference Sites: Listening to Users through Server Statistics and Query Logs. Reference & User Services Quarterly, 42(2), 155-163.
Why it's innovative: This site was based on looking at and analyzing user behavior. It's an attempt to create a page that meets the needs of the particular users of the site. While this shouldn't be an innovative practice, too few sites do this kind of user-centered design.
Reviewed: June 2003

Institution: University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
Title: Quick Reference
URL: http://www.lib.unc.edu/reference/quick/
Contact: Donna Cornick: cornick@refstaff.lib.unc.edu
Description: This site has organized many reference/informational sites into the following categories: General Topics, Area & Cultural Studies, Arts & Humanities, Business & Economics, Government Information, Science & Technology, and Social Sciences. Each large category is further subdivided, for example some subdivisions under Arts & Humanities are Art, Classical Studies, Costume and Design, Drama, and Music. The links under each category lead to a combination of free web sites and subscription databases. This is an attractive and easy to use site, that has effectively organized a great deal of online information.
Why it's innovative: It broadens the definition of "reference menu" beyond the traditional. The site is created by an PHP/MySQL database, so it is easy to update and keep current, although creating and maintaining the site is a shared effort of a number of librarians. They are creating a search function for the site that should be working early Fall semester 2003.
Reviewed: June 2003

Institution: University of Minnesota
Title: Reference Sources
URL: http://www.lib.umn.edu/reference/
Contact: Shane Nackerud: snackeru@umn.edu
Description: Reference Sources not only links to many categories of online general reference sources (Biographies, Countries, Quotations, Statistics, etc) but it also links to over 200 subject specific reference categories--Alternative Medicine, American Indian Studies, Company Information, Psychology, to name a few. Within each subject category, the sources are grouped by Abstracts and Indexes, Catalogs and Bibliographies, General Reference Sources (Biographical, Dictionaries, Encyclopedias, etc), Style Manuals and Writing Guides, and University of Minnesota sites. The resources listed in the general reference category are only online sources. Under the subject categories both print and online sources are listed with clear distinction made between sources available to everyone and those limited to the campus community. This site also lists the Top 10 Reference Sources, with a note that these top 10 are based on use over the past 30 days, so the Top 10 list will change over time.
Why it's innovative: This is an impressive organization of a huge number of web sites. It is easy for first time users to understand the organization and the navigation of the site. The Top 10 Reference Sources puts the most frequently used sites right up front.
Reviewed: June 2003

Reviewer: Vicki Mills