Re: reserve question

["Laurie Urquiaga" <Urquiagal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I know our main library tends to limit professors to 9 reserve articles/semester, and I don't think the quantity of other material is calculated.  

~I~ would definitely consider the required purchase of a textbook to be included in the calculation of proportionality, but I don't usually rely on that factor.  If I did, though, I'd likely look at the total number of pages for the course including the entire textbook (I wouldn't limit the count to actual pages assigned from the textbook) and figure out what percentage were outside readings.  If 'small proportion' is the measure, then I'd guess 20-25% would be a reasonable upper limit.

What I actually do is encourage professors in the law school to use a resource like Lexis or West, for which we purchase a license, and link to assigned readings online (no copying required).  If we do go to the effort of creating a coursepack, we do pay royalties, and then I have one or two copies placed in reserve in their entirety.  Under the first sale doctrine, once the royalties and copy costs have been paid, I figure the library now owns a legitimate copy of the packet and it's nobody's business but our own where we choose to store it.  We also purchase a single copy of every textbook and place it in the reserve collection, so in theory the students don't have to purchase anything.  Experience shows, however, that unless the royalties are so high as to make the price of the packet unreasonable, they'll purchase both packet and textbook for the convenience of having their own copy free from competition.

Laureen C. Urquiaga
Assistant Director for Access Services
Law School Copyright Coordinator

urquiagal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


>>> "Neely, Linda G." <neely1lg@xxxxxxxxx> 9/23/02 9:31:01 AM >>>
I have a question about the fair-use guidelines for electronic reserves
developed during the CONFU process in 1996.
 
One of the guidelines, under Scope of Material, states that "the total
amount of material included in electronic reserve systems for a specific
course as a matter of fair use should be a small proportion of the total
assigned reading for a particular course."...
And are you counting textbooks the students are required to purchase as
assigned readings?
 
Two examples:
 
How many articles can be placed on reserve:
 
- if the instructor is requiring a course pack of 20 articles and one
textbook?
 
- if the instructor is requiring two textbooks?