Simply put, they are guides designed to get you started in finding information relevant to your School and Department. Subject Guides are not exhaustive – they are just the key materials you must become familiar with.
MetSearch is a gateway to all premium, paid content that your lecturers and librarians have purchased to support you in your courses. MetSearch is a multi-million pound resource that, unlike Google Scholar, helps you find quality, peer-reviewed, academically-relevant scholarly materials. It is partially funded by you in your course fees so it makes a lot of sense to use it. When you search, MetSearch usually gives you many 1000s of results – so it’s important to filter your results e.g. by subject or date.
An alternative search approach is to search more specifically by subject. Usually, you’ll get less, but more specific, results (you may still need to filter).
See our Finding Resources and Subject Support pages to learn more.