http://thereport.amnesty.org/

Amnesty International's annual report on the state of the world's human rights has always been a valuable read. The organization continues to expand the scope of the report this year by offering detailed country summaries and a number of multimedia features, such as photo montages, video clips, and customizable charts and tables. Visitors can use the drop-down menu on the homepage to look for specialized reports on each country, and they should also make sure to read the Foreword written by Irene Khan, the Secretary General of Amnesty International. The "Facts and Figures" area offers some nice visual representation of some of the facts from the report, including those related to freedom of expression, asylum seekers, prisoners of conscience, and executions. Visitors interested in regional profiles can click on the "World By Region" area to get a breakdown of the situation in different regions of the world. Finally, the "Global Themes" area includes topical overviews of some of the most pressing issues around the world, including violence against women and the ethical considerations surrounding counter terrorism tactics. [KMG]

http://dl.lib.brown.edu/bamco/index.html

The Brown Archival & Manuscripts Collection Online (BAMCO) is a digital repository which contains documents related to many different subjects, including poetry, the history of Rhode Island, American political and diplomatic history, the history of science, and women's studies. This site provides users with finding aids for these various collections, along with digitized version of more than a dozen of said collections. Visitors can click on the "Browse all collections" area to look at all of the materials, or they can use the "Browse collections w/digital facsimiles", if they know they only want digitized materials. The currently digitized collections include the papers of James Manning (who corresponded with many a prominent Baptist minister in the late 18th century) and the Albert E. Lownes collection on Henry David Thoreau, to name only two. The Lownes collection contains books by Thoreau, critical works, and so on. The site also has contact information for those looking to ask specific questions about the collections. [KMG]

http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/index.php/papers/series/

As the home of one of the world's strongest economics departments, it stands to reason that the working paper series at Oxford University would also be quite impressive. It is, and economists, policy analysts, and others will find much to occupy their time on this site. The papers are arranged chronologically, and first-time visitors might do well to take a look through some of their more recent works to get a general feel for the materials here. Some of the more recent paper titles include "What is the Top Priority on Climate Change?", "A Century of Economic Growth in Latin America", and "Competitive IPOs". The papers are drawn from a number of series, including the Oxford Financial Research Centre Economics Series and the Global Poverty Research Group. [KMG]

http://www.brookings.edu/reports/2009/~/media/Files/rc/reports/2009/0507_community_college_goldrick_rab/0507_community_college_brief.pdf

Community colleges are the bedrock of American higher education, and young and old alike use their facilities to gain specific technical skills and explore the world of the liberal arts. This May 2009 policy brief from the Brookings Institution's Blueprint for American Prosperity series offers a few policy suggestions on how the federal government might reinvest in community colleges across the nation. The twelve-page brief was authored by Sara Goldrick-Rab, Douglas N. Harris, Christopher Mazzeo, and Gregory Kienzi. The brief offers a number of concrete suggestions for the federal government, including the recommendation that they should establish national postsecondary goals and also devote a significant portion of existing funding to improve and evaluate teaching practices in these institutions. [KMG]

To find this resource and more high-quality online resources in math and science visit Scout's sister site - AMSER, the Applied Math and Science Educational Repository at http://amser.org.

http://wps.prenhall.com/bp_berenson_bbs_11/

As business is one of the most popular undergraduate majors in the United States, it stands to reason that there are a number of specialized textbooks and supporting instructional materials that are dedicated to various topics within this field. This particular website is designed to serve as the companion to a basic business statistic textbook published by Prentice Hall, and it contains quizzes, overviews, and other materials that will be helpful to both students of the discipline and educators. The materials here are divided into nineteen chapters that cover topics like sampling, data presentation, linear regression, and decision making. Visitors can also take advantage of the search engine here, which is located at the top right-hand corner of each page. [KMG]

To find this resource and more high-quality online resources in math and science visit Scout's sister site - AMSER, the Applied Math and Science Educational Repository at http://amser.org.

http://luna.ku.edu:8180/luna/servlet

The University of Kansas' Kenneth Spencer Research Library website offers many interesting collections, including "Kansas Wildflowers", "Invertebrate Paleontology" and "Florence Nightingale Letters". Their well-executed digitized collection on "Mediterranean Travel and Trade 1300-1800" is fascinating and rather lovely, as the scans of the white/ecru book pages, documents, journals, maps, illustrations, etc. contrast well with the black background that was chosen for the website. The result is not just restful on the eyes, but also elegant, and allows for unhindered, intense study of the documents at hand. Other features that enable researchers or the intellectually curious to easily work with the materials are the "Add to Workspace" and "Export" options in the upper left and right hand corners, respectively, of an item chosen to view in more detail. The "Export" feature allows for saving, but the "Add to Workspace" allows the image to be added to one's presentations or other media. Additionally, dragging the cursor over the image allows for viewing help, viewing the image information, dragging the image, and fitting the image to the frame. [KMG]

http://digitalcollections.library.oregonstate.edu/cdm4/client/mewaters/

This extremely well-researched website offers a unique perspective on the Middle East, by presenting multi- and interdisciplinary documents, books, data, journal and newspaper articles that are devoted solely to water. The Middle East Water Collection website, presented by the Oregon State University libraries, examines the very complex issues that water presents, "to provide a greater understanding of the multi-disciplinary nature of water and its interactions with politics, development, social issues, culture and religion." Additionally, the online collection is just a part of the complete 9000 item collection available at Oregon State University. Visitors can search via "Region/Country", "Basins", "Subjects", or "Full Text" by using the drop down boxes on the left hand side of the homepage. The "My Favorites" tab near the top of the page allows visitors to save any of the items to their own favorites page, simply by clicking "Add to Favorites" at the bottom of the entry they want to save. A pop-up window will display indicating the item has been saved to the visitors' page. [KMG]

To find this resource and more high-quality online resources in math and science visit Scout's sister site - AMSER, the Applied Math and Science Educational Repository at http://amser.org.

http://www.edc.uri.edu/riatlas/

Geographic Information System (GIS) technology is used to assist planners, scientists, geographers, and others to visualize data sets. This particular project created draws on data from the state of Rhode Island's Geographic Information System (RIGIS) database in order to assist land managers and other interested parties. The project was created with support from the Environmental Protection Agency, the University of Rhode Island Cooperative Extension, and a number of other organizations. On the site, visitors can click on maps of forests and wetlands, land use patterns, groundwater resources, soil hydrology, and biodiversity. On the site's homepage, visitors can also use the "Towns" drop down menu to look at information for different cities throughout the state. Additionally, the "Watershed Atlas" area provides detailed maps of the twelve watersheds located in Rhode Island. [KMG]

To find this resource and more high-quality online resources in math and science visit Scout's sister site - AMSER, the Applied Math and Science Educational Repository at http://amser.org.