As we approach the end of spring semester, your students may be working on major research projects. (Or, looking ahead to summer, you may have some research and writing projects of your own planned). Citing sources is often a less-favored aspect of the research process; the library’s RefWorks database can help! As an alternative to creating citations from scratch or using free online citation generators, RefWorks is a web-based tool for collecting and organizing your sources and creating pre-formatted bibliographies in hundreds of citation styles (including all the major styles, as well as many journal-specific citation formats). As a bonus for students, RefWorks allows alumni to continue to access their RefWorks account after they graduate.
Clark Library’s RefWorks guide offers guidance and brief online tutorials about getting started, organizing references, reading and annotating, and sharing and collaborating with RefWorks. Additionally, learn about tools for writing papers with RefWorks; these optional plug-ins integrate into Microsoft Word or Google Docs to assist with formatting in-text citations (or footnotes) as well as bibliographies.
If you or your students would like a guided overview of RefWorks, please contact us at reference@up.edu or make an appointment to meet with a librarian.