http://webapps01.un.org/vawdatabase/home.action

This web-based database was launched in March of 2009, and is the result of a resolution adopted by the UN Secretary-General to eliminate all types of violence against women. A good place for visitors to start searching the extensive database is by clicking on the "About the Database" tab at the top of the homepage. To see the content of the questionnaire that was sent to all UN Member States, visitors can click on the hyperlink "Questionnaire on Violence Against Women" in the second paragraph. By clicking on the "Country Pages" tab at the top of the home page visitors can view a particular country's treatment of violence against women. For visitors interested in reading about the practices that some countries have in place, clicking on the "Good Practices" tab at the top of the homepage will take them there. The good practices are divided up into promising practices in law, prevention, and the provisioning of services. The "Advanced Search" tab at the top of the homepage allows visitors to search using various criteria, including type of measure taken to address violence against women, form of violence, country, and year. [KMG]

http://www.frbsf.org/publications/federalreserve/monetary/index.html

Understanding the activities and operations of the U.S. Federal Reserve and its monetary policies can be a bit confusing, so it's nice to know that the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco has created this fine resource for the general public. The resource begins by offering a brief overview of U.S. monetary policy, and visitors can read the five sections in their entirety here. These sections address questions like "How is the Federal Reserve structured?" and "What are the tools of U.S. monetary policy?". Additionally, the site includes a glossary of terms that covers everything from "absolute advantage" to "zero-coupon mortgage". The site is rounded out by a list of suggested readings, a search engine, and a place to sign up for the Bank's RSS feed. [KMG]

http://www.uflib.ufl.edu/ufdc/?c=sanborn

Students of urban history will be happy to learn about the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of Florida collection created by the staff members at the Smathers Libraries' Map & Imagery Library at the University of Florida. The Sanborn maps have an interesting history, as they were originally produced in the 1860s in order to help fire insurance agents determine insurance premiums in over 12000 cities and towns across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. These most detailed maps contained information on the size, shape, and construction of buildings, along with information about various pieces of the urban infrastructure, census figures, railroad lines, and property boundaries. This particular collection includes more than 3000 map sheets dating from 1860 to 1923. They cover the area from Pensacola down to Key West, and visitors can search the entire database, click on the "New Items" tab, or get a bit more background information by using the "Map Key". [KMG]

http://www.poynter.org/subject.asp?id=2

The Poynter Institute has created this lovely and thorough resource especially for practicing journalists, and it contains a rather impressive storehouse of practical tips and suggestions. At the top of the homepage, visitors will find the top story of the day, along with links to the most recent articles submitted by various contributors and Institute staff members. Further down the page, visitors can read through the "Related Resources" area, which includes topical articles such as "25 Non-Random Things About Writing Short" and "Putting Voters in the Analyst's Seat". Visitors can email each article to a friend, place a link to the article on their own homepage, or sign up for RSS feeds. Close to the bottom of the page, visitors can meander through the "Latest Poynter Blogs" area, which include topical offerings like "The Biz Blog", "E-Media Tidbits", and "Diversity at Work". [KMG]

http://www.livablestreets.com/

Planners, engineers, and designers have been interested in creating healthy and livable urban environments for decades, and the general public's penchant for such matters has grown exponentially as of late. The Livable Streets Initiative is one such measure designed to assist citizens who might be thinking about how to put these ideas into practice. The Initiative is produced by The Open Planning Project, which is a non-profit technology incubator designed to enhance civic participation. First-time visitors to the site will find the following sections: "Streetsblog", "Streetfilms", "Streetswiki", "Community", and "Education". In the "Streetsblog" section, visitors can read recent posts about designing pedestrian friendly streetscapes and also view short films about different planning projects related to such modifications. Moving on, the "Streetswiki" area is a community-created online encyclopedia for transportation, urban environmental, and public space issues. Visitors can read recently edited articles, sign up to help edit, and also just wander around to pieces on "Sidewalks", "Light Rail", and "Bus Rapid Transit". Finally, visitors should also check out the "Community" area to learn about different local community groups that are working on these issues. [KMG]

http://dels.nas.edu/ag_education/

Academic programs in agriculture have been a staple of many institutions for well over a century. Recently, the National Research Council crafted this thoughtful report which looks at how undergraduate agricultural education might be transformed to attract new students and "keep pace with changing times". The Council created this special site to provide interested parties with the text of the 94-page report released in March 2009, along with extra information, such as background papers and related reports. Visitors who don't want to read the entire report can view a four-page brief and also read through the nine primary recommendations. These recommendations include creating a focus on building strategic partnerships, a focused review of undergraduate programs in agriculture, and broadening the overall student experience. Additionally, visitors can learn about the study committee which was convened to create this report and also sign up for email updates about forthcoming publications. [KMG]

http://manuscripts.cmrs.ucla.edu/

The wide cornucopia of digitized medieval manuscripts is a real boon to historians, art historians, and those with a penchant for such documents. However, it can be taxing to sort through a wide range of sites to narrow in on the documents of primary interest, but that process just got much easier via the Catalogue of Digitized Medieval Manuscripts. The idea for the Catalogue was first mentioned in a talk at the MLA conference by Christopher Baswell in 2005, and it became a possibility as a result of support from the Center for Medieval Renaissance Studies at UCLA. The Catalogue provides interested parties with a centralized database of links to various medieval manuscripts online. Currently, visitors can either perform a detailed search across the database or browse around the collection by location, author, title, language, or repository. The database contains links to over 1000 manuscripts and more are being added on a regular basis. [KMG]

http://www.wooster.edu/beatstudies/reviews/default.html

Interest in the work of the so-called "Beat" writers has continued unabated for well over half a century, and The Beat Review publishes a great deal of material on their legacy. Based at the College of Wooster, The Beat Review contains information on new Beat scholarship and other Beat works. The publication is peer-reviewed, and visitors are welcome to submit their own reviews and review suggestions to the editor. The first issue was published in the summer of 2007, and the Review tends to be published three to four times a year. It's easy to get a sense of their work by looking over a sample issue, which typically contains approximately six or seven critical reviews of works on people like Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, and Jack Kerouac. Finally, visitors can also learn about signing up to join the Beat Studies Association if they so desire. [KMG]