Course Reserves Policy
Mercer University faculty and instructors can make available supplemental course materials, such as PDFs and physical books, via Course Reserves. By placing an item on reserve, the faculty member can ensure that high-demand materials are equally available to all students in the course.
Physical Reserves
Faculty members may place books, articles, video recordings, sound recordings, music scores, and other materials on reserve for their students to check out for limited loan periods. These materials may be copies owned by the library or personal copies owned by the faculty member. The library cannot be held responsible for personal copies that are lost, damaged, or not returned by students.
Faculty members may request the library purchase material they wish to place on reserve, contingent upon availability of funding. The library does not place items on reserve that are a part of Special Collections, items obtained through Interlibrary Loan, consumable items such as test and test booklets or course packs, and personal subscription items such as streaming services like Netflix.
Physical Reserve Process
Faculty must complete a course reserve form per course to accompany all material. Faculty may select a lending period of 3-hours, 1-day, 3-days, or 1-week. Course reserves accrue a fine of $1 per hour or day overdue, depending on which lending period is selected. Materials placed on reserve must comply with U.S. copyright laws.
Once a request is received, a minimum of two (2) business days processing time is required to make new reserve items available to students. Additional processing time may be required at the beginning of semesters. Materials that must be ordered also require additional processing time.
At the end of the semester, all materials are removed, and personal copies are returned to faculty members.
Reposting of the same material for use in a subsequent semester requires a new course reserve form, due to copyright compliance.
E-Reserves
NOTE: It is the responsibility of the faculty member to check copyright compliance before submitting any materials print materials (including photocopied materials) for digitization for eReserves. Faculty must perform due diligence in checking for the availability of electronic forms of said material, including (but not limited to) eBooks, open-source materials, or any electronic copy that meets the standards for fair use, and which does not violate copyright law (i.e., date of authors’ death, plus 70 years, etc.).
After completing the above process, the Mercer University Libraries may accept from faculty, certain types of photocopies and scan them for electronic reserves. All reserve photocopies must be submitted by the course instructor. The library cannot photocopy articles for placement on reserve. The photocopies must:
- reproduce well and be on 8 1/2 x 11″ paper to accommodate scanning.
- include copies of the title page(s) that clearly indicate the title, author, and publication/copyright date.
Copyright Information
Mercer University Libraries endorse the Guidelines for Electronic Reserves from the University System of Georgia.
- Permission from the copyright holder is required if the item is to be reused in a subsequent academic term for the same course offered by the same instructor or if the item is a standard assigned or optional reading for an individual course taught in multiple sections by many instructors. This does not apply if the entire book is placed on reserve.
- The library will not seek copyright clearance for reserve material exceeding fair use guidelines. Seeking copyright clearance and covering fees is up to the professor.
- Copies of materials which require copyright permissions and for which appropriate permissions cannot be obtained are not placed on reserve.
If a faculty member wishes to obtain permission for materials that do not meet Fair Use, the American Association of Publishers suggests that the following information be included in a permission request letter (self-addressed return envelope to permission department of the publisher in question) to the copyright owner:
- title, author and/or editor, and edition of materials to be duplicated.
- exact material to be used, giving amount, page numbers, chapters, and, if possible, a photocopy of the material.
- number of copies to be made.
- purpose of duplicated materials
- form of distribution (classroom, newsletter, etc.)
- whether or not the material is to be sold.
- type of reprint (ditto, photography, offset, typeset)
The process of granting permission requires time for the publisher to check the copyright status and evaluate the request’s nature. It is advisable, therefore, to allow enough lead time to obtain permission before the materials are needed.
The Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) also has the right to grant permission and collect fees for photocopying rights for certain publications. Dealing with the CCC, when applicable, can often prove more efficient than dealing directly with publishers.
All letters of permission received from publishers, evidence of fees paid, and the evidence of permission granted by the publisher are kept on file.