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EReserves Copyright Guidelines

The UCSF Library guidelines for EReserves (Electronic Course Reserves) are based on the principle that the fair use provisions of the Copyright Act of 1976, Section 107 permit the making of copies of copyrighted material for classroom use as long as the four determining fair use factors are considered. This policy includes a number of the guidelines included in the Fair Use Guidelines for Electronic Reserve Systems developed by participants in the Conference on Fair Use (CONFU). The UCSF Library actively monitors the evolving digital copyright policies and guidelines and will modify its practices as necessary.

Placement of Materials on EReserves

The UCSF Library will place material requested by UCSF instructional faculty and staff on EReserves under the following conditions:

  • The UCSF Library or the University of California has a current license for access to digital versions of copyrighted material (e.g. Nature, Cochrane Library, Harrison's Online, Encyclopedia Britannica, etc). In these instances the citation and link to the electronic version of the material will be added to the electronic reserve system, thus providing direct access to the requested material.
  • A print version of any copyrighted material to be copied or scanned for electronic reserves has been lawfully acquired by or will be purchased by the library, a UCSF department/school, or UCSF faculty or instructional staff. Library staff may scan the material for placement in the electronic reserve system.
  • Scanned material will be available for use during the entire academic session in which the course is offered.
  • There will be no charge for access to EReserves materials; the charge for copies made by students on library printers will be the same as for all other library printing.
  • A copyright notice will appear on screen in the online reserve system and on copies of copyrighted material made of reserve readings. 
  • Copyrighted materials on EReserves will be accessible only by faculty name, course name/course number.
  • Should the reproduction of a particular item that you wish to place on reserve be prohibited by the above standards, it is possible for faculty to pay for copyright clearance to allow its use. The Academic Licensing and Permissions Service of the Copyright Clearance Center provides an automated copyright permissions service.

Guidelines for Staff Scanning/Copying of Materials for EReserves

Library staff will scan copyrighted materials for placement on EReserves without obtaining copyright permission for a course so long as any one item scanned does not exceed the guidelines listed below:

  • one journal or newspaper article from the same volume;
  • one chapter from a book;
  • an excerpt from a prose work so long as the excerpt does not exceed more than 10% of the work;
  • or one chart, graph, diagram, drawing, cartoon or picture per book or per journal issue.

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