Foster Business Library Databases:

The Foster Business Library offers an extensive collection of business databases on its homepage; see under Business Databases; see also the four folders at the top of that list for lists of Foster databases by topic:  Books, Articles--Full Text, Articles--Citations and Abstracts, and Company and Industry.   For more information on the three dozen Foster business databases, click here.   Because these databases are very expensive, access to them from off-campus is limited to authenticated U.W. users; for more information on accessing Foster databases from off campus, click here.
• Statistical Universe:
  Under Business Databases on the Foster Business Library homepage. Statistical Universe is an index to statistical data in commercial, international and U.S. government publications. Try the Power Tables for quick access to tables of data in GIF format. (Available from off-campus.)

  A search on the Keyword student loans produced a list of 23 tables; limiting the search to U.S. cut the list to 18 tables. A search on the Keyword college enrollment, limited to the U.S., produced a list of 12 tables.

Unlike the library databases above, these web resources are free and can be accessed anywhere.

• The National Center for Education Statistics:
  This agency has the primary U.S. government responsibility for collecting and analyzing data concerning education in the U.S. and in other countries. The site offers both Quick Tables & Figures and a site Search feature. The 2000 Digest of Education Statistics can also be browsed on the web.

  A site search on Federal Consolidation Loans retrieved over 3,300 results. See also the Postsecondary Education section in the Digest of Education Statistics.

• Direct Loans:
  This U.S. Department of Education site provides centralized information about the William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan Program for financial aid professionals and for students.

  See the Direct Consolidation Loans section.

• Direct Consolidation Loans:
  This U.S. Department of Education site specializes in providing information on direct consolidation loans to borrowers, schools, and loan holders.

  See the FAQ section for information about direct consolidation loans.

• Office of Postsecondary Education:
  This U.S. Department of Education office provides information and data on financial aid and admissions for students as well as for institutions.

  See the OPE Program Data section.

• Educaid Loan Programs:
  Educaid is one of the largest education lenders in the U.S. and is a division of First Union National Bank, providing education loans since 1984.

  See the Federal Consolidation Loan section.

• Federal Direct Student Loan Program:
  This site is sponsored by a group of guaranty agencies who participate in the Federal Family Education Loan Program and are committed to providing information about higher education and career opportunities. The three dozen sponsors of this site are largely state student loan and financial assistance organizations.

  See the section on Direct Consolidation Loans.

• Collegiate Funding Services:
  CFS was initially organized to take advantage of specific customer benefit and service needs and problems that existed in the student loan industry, specifically within the Federal Consolidation Loan market. They claim to be one of the fastest-growing Federal Consolidation Loan Programs in the country, backed by some of the nation's largest lenders. Student financial aid professionals at over three hundred colleges and universities have established relationships with CFS.

  See their Loan Features section.

The Foster Business Library reference collection consists of business handbooks, encyclopedias, dictionaries and other quick reference tools. It is located behind the Reference Desk in the center of the library's first floor. The reference works listed below are arranged according to call number and, since none of these books circulate, they should always be available--except when in use by a library user. Some of these reference works are arranged by SIC code; to determine a company's Standard Industrial Code, click here. The following reference books are arranged by call number. The Foster Reference Collection is located behind the Reference Desk in Foster.

• Statistical abstract of the United States
  Information about many industries as well as demographic information; check index for references to tables. The sources for each table are often a valuable source of additional information.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HA202 .U56

  See the Education chapter on pages 149 to 198; in particular, see table 297 on page 183 for the number of higher educational institutions in the U.S.; see also table 309 on page 190 for Federal Student Financial Assistance, 1994 to 2000.

• The American marketplace : demographics and spending patterns.
  Trends in education, health, income, labor, living arrangements, population, spending, and wealth.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HA214 .A46 1997

  See the chapter on Education Trends, pages 3 to 45.

• Consumer dimensions 2000.
  Trend data on U.S. population, marital and housing status, education, employment, income, residence location, race and ethnicity, food and beverage, shopping, personal care, health and health care expenditures, internet usage, sports and fitness, leisure time, travel, automotive, financial and alcohol and tobacco.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HC110.C6 C562 2000

  See chapter three for Education, pages 59 to 71.

• Generation X : the young adult market.
  Attitudes, education, health, income, labor force, population, spending and wealth information for those born between 1965 and 1976.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HC110.C6 M544 1997

  See chapter two for Education, pages 37 to 51.

Foster Business Library General Stacks:

The Foster Business Library maintains a collection of over 60,000 books on all business topics. To identify books on a particular topic, go to the upper left menu on the Foster homepage and select UW Libraries Catalog. Try searching by Keywords. Use the Limit/Sort feature to create a list of books in the Foster Business Library and in order from newest book to oldest. To do so, use the pulldown menu under WHERE item is located to specify Foster Business Library and click on the box near the bottom Sort results by year. Then click on Limit/sort items retrieved using above data. Clicking on the titles in the resulting list will bring up the full catalog record, indicating which Foster collection has the book (general stacks, reference, reserve, etc.), plus the call number and the circulation status.

Note the LC Subjects for the books that are most relevant for your topic; they may provide a more targeted list of books. These subject headings are clickable but you will have to use the Limit/Sort button to restrict your list just to books in the Foster Business Library collection.

Circulation status is indicated in the box in the middle of each online catalog record, on the right. Check Shelf indicates that the book should be on the shelves under that call number and available for you to check out. Due and a date indicates that the book is already checked out to someone and is due back on the date indicated. Books that are already checked out to someone else, or books at the Bothell or Tacoma campus libraries (or elsewhere on the Seattle campus) may be reserved for your use and sent here to Foster by using the Request button on the upper menu. Books unavailable in any of the University of Washington Libraries may be available in the collections of Central Washington University, Eastern Washington University, The Evergreen State College, Washington State University, or Western Washington University through the Cascade online catalog. To search Cascade, use the menu button for Repeat Search in Cascade. It can take from a few days to a week or more to obtain books from other libraries and to have them sent to Foster for you to pick up so use this option only if you can afford to wait.

The Foster general stacks collection is located south of the main part of the Foster Business Library, through the two pass-throughs into the basement of Balmer. The arrangement is by call number, from A (at the east end, near the Copy Center) to Z (at the far west end).

A Keyword search on Federal Consolidation Loans retrieved a list of 25 records, none of which were in the Foster Business Library. Most of the records were for titles in Government Publications Section in the basement of the Allen Library. There are also 20 titles listed under the author William D Ford Federal Direct Loan Program. An LC Subject Search for Student Aid--United States retrieved a list of 223 records while a search for Student Loan Funds--United States retrieved a list of 194 records. None of these records were for books in the Foster Business Library.

The Foster Business Library maintains a collection of thousands of corporate annual reports for over 700 U.S. and foreign companies. These reports are filed in lateral filing cabinets near the Foster Reference desk under the sign Corporate Annual Reports. Reports are filed alphabetically by company name and may be checked out of the library at the Circulation/Reserve desk. For a complete list of the companies in this collection, click here.

This collection includes the annual reports for federal student loan companies as First Union.

Foster Business Library Full Text Article Databases:

In addition to the 800 journals in the periodicals collection, the Foster Business Library offers access to 11,000 full text periodical articles through its full text article databases such as:  ABI/Inform Global, Dow Jones Interactive, Expanded Academic ASAP, and Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe. These article databases may be found on the Foster Business Library homepage, listed alphabetically under Business Databases or in the Articles: Full Text folder.

Of these four main sources, all but Dow Jones Interactive are available from any computer on the campus network (as well as from home) via the UW Connectivity Kit or via the Libraries' proxy server. Dow Jones Interactive is only available in the Foster Business Library and a few other locations (due to current contract restrictions). The easiest of these databases to use are ABI/Inform Global and Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe. For more information about accessing Foster Business Library databases from off campus, click here. For more information about business databases, click here.

• ABI/Inform:

  This database provides abstracting and indexing for business and related literature from 1971 for over 4,600 publications, with full text for over 700 journals from 1992 and is divided into a number of parts on the Foster Business Library homepage:   ABI/Inform Global, National Newspapers, Research Library, and Washington State Newstand. By using the Change Database to all databases, you can search all of these sources in your searches.

  To find articles on specific topics, search by word or phrase, clicking on New Search, By Word. The default time period is 1999 to present but you can use the pulldown menu to specify either Backfile, 1986-1998 or Deep Backfile, Prior to 1986. The default for Basic searches is Citations and abstracts but you may use the pulldown menu to expand your search to the full text of articles. Your search terms will be highlighted in red in each article. This database may be accessed anywhere on campus and from home (via the connectivity kit or proxy server). Search tips for this database are available by clicking here.

  As an example, a search in the entire ABI/Inform database (ALL databases) for full text articles for the phrase Federal Consolidation Loans retrieved a list of 42 full text articles, looking in current, post-1999 publications, where this phrase appeared in the citations and abstracts. Expanding this search throughout the full text of all articles retrieved a list of 76 full text articles. Changing the search to Federal Consolidation Loans and market share retrieved no articles.

• Dow Jones Interactive:

  This database provides online access to 2,000 full-text business and trade publications, including the Wall Street Journal. Find news about topics in the Publications Library, under Search By Words. This database will search for your topic throughout the full text of each article but you can limit your search (and retrieve more relevant articles) by using the pulldown menu and selecting Headline Only, Lead Paragraph Only, or Headline & Lead Paragraph. The default date range for your search is Current Year which will limit the number of articles retrieved. You can use the date range pulldown menu to specify All Dates, Current & Previous Year, or Current Day, Current Month or Current & Previous Month. Be sure to specify All Publications as part of your search. This database is only available in the Foster Business Library and a few other locations; it is not available from home or office. Your search terms will be highlighted in black in each article. Search tips for this database are available by clicking here.

  A search for Federal Consolidation Loans in this database, in all publications, for current and previous year, searching for this term, in headlines and lead paragraphs, retrieved a list of just two articles. A similar search for this term throughout the full text of all articles retrieved a list of 26 articles. A similar search on Federal Consolidation Loans and market share retrieved no articles. Searching instead for the term Federal w/2 consolidation w/2 loans retrieved a list of 33 articles, searching throughout the full text of all articles. Limiting this search to just headline and lead paragraph cut the number of articles, from the past two years, to just three.

• Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe:

  Provides access to nearly 5,300 newspapers and journals in news, business and legal information. Go to the News area and search General News to find news about a topic. To do comprehensive searches in this database, you must search Major Newspapers and Magazines & Journals separately. The default search in this database is in major newspapers for the previous six months but pulldown menus allow you change these defaults. The date range pulldown menu allows searches to cover all dates, for the widest possible searches. This database is available in all locations on campus and from home. Your search terms will be highlighted in black in this database. Search tips for this database are available by clicking here.

  For instance, a search in this database on the keyword Federal w/2 consolidation w/2 loans for the previous two years, retrieved just two newspaper articles and no magazine articles.

Help:

The Foster Business Library Reference Desk is staffed most of the hours that the library is open. The staff at the desk will be happy to identify research tools on any business subject. For research guides on a wide variety of industries, products, companies, issues and topics, see the Team Librarian Consultation archives. In addition, see the library resources webpage for BA Courses. The UW Libraries also has an Education Librarian, Laura Lillard, who would be more knowledgeable on the education side of this topic than a business librarian. Her phone number is 206-685-1594 and her e-mail address is lill@u.washington.edu; her office is in the Allen Library Reference Services Department.