The Library’s Course Reserves must comply with U.S. copyright law and the limitations of exclusive rights outlined by Fair Use (17 U.S.C. +107).  Course Reserves requests submitted by faculty should meet the following guidelines:

• The amount of material should be reasonable in relation to the total amount of material assigned for one term of a course taking into account the nature of the course, its subject matter, and level. Generally this is interpreted as no more than 10% of a work or one article, one or two chapters of a book, or a complete poem.
• The effect of using the material should not be detrimental to the market for the work. In general, the Library should own at least one copy of the work.
• A full bibliographic citation must be provided for all copyrighted material requested for Electronic Reserve.

Access to copyrighted materials on electronic Course Reserves will be password protected. Library staff will provide faculty with a password for each course for which there is copyrighted material on electronic Course Reserves. Faculty are responsible for sharing the password with only their students and informing them of the importance of copyright protection.

More on Copyright and Higher Education

For more information on copyright, fair use and Course Reserves in higher education, read:

• Statement on Fair Use and Electronic Reserves from the Association of College and Research Libraries
• Code of Best Practices in Fair Use from the Association of Research Libraries
• FAQ for Professors: Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Academic and Research Libraries from the Center for Media and Social Impact at American University
• Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the U.S. from Cornell Copyright Information Center