Ask What Your Country Can Do For You: Free Government Web Sites and the SOLs

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Ask What Your Country Can Do For YouFree
Government Web Sites and the SOLs

• Keith Weimer
• University of Richmond
• Maryke Huyding
• Hollins University

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Why Are We Here?

• Government web sites are rich sources of
  information.
• They can be teaching tools for History and Civics
  SOLs.
• Government web sites are free, and you should
  take advantage of them.
• Its our job to tell you about them.

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Who We Are and What We DoFederal Depository
Librarians

• 1789 -- Federal government founded on principle
  of public access to government information.
• 1895 General Printing Act (Title 44 USC)
  requires government printing to be centralized
  through Government Printing Office (GPO) and
  creates system of Federal Depository Libraries.

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Who We Are and What We DoFederal Depository
Librarians (cont.)

• 1962 Depository Library Act allows libraries to
  choose which government documents to accept
  (selective depositories).
• Regional libraries receive all government
  documents (Virginias is Alderman Library at
  UVA).
• Government documents librarians manage
  collections of federal documents in print,
  microform and electronic format.

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Government Information on the Web

• Since mid-1990s, increasing move to make
  government information available via the World
  Wide Web.
• Since late 1990s, moving towards electronic-only
  documents.
• Most government information before mid-1990s is
  not available on the World Wide Web.

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Government Information on the Web (cont.)

• . . . is available to anyone with access to a PC
  and the Internet, and government web sites are
  getting easier to locate
• Meta sites, organized by subject (like
  Firstgov, science.gov, business.gov) are easy
  places to start without needing to know which
  agency to go to.
• Agency URLs are usually agency abbreviation.gov
  (example, cia.gov, usda.gov, usdoj.gov)

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How Do Government Web Sites Support the SOLs?

• By providing free, full-text access to primary
  sources, including
• Laws, regulations, court decisions
• Examples showing the legislative process and
  other government agencies at work
• U.S. and Virginia Constitutions, Federalist
  Papers and other historical documents, images and
  audio files

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How Do Government Web Sites Support the SOLs?
(cont.)

• By providing free, full-text access to other
  educational materials, including
• Lesson plans
• Timelines
• Online activities (example, web quests in
  American Memory Project)
• Multimedia exhibits
• Textbooks

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Outline of Todays PresentationSites for US
Government

• Gateways and Search Engines Virginia, FirstGov,
  Google UncleSam
• Legislative and Executive Branch THOMAS, GPO
  Access
• Disclosure Project Vote Smart, Opensecrets,
  National Security Archive
• Lunch (12-1)

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Outline (cont.) Sites for US History

• Primary Sources Avalon Project and OurDocuments
• Find It VA/SIRS
• American Memory Project and National Archives
• Vietnam Project
• Wrap Up (315-330)

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