Course Reserves

Readings must come from library materials, faculty owned print materials that have been pre-approved for library purchase, or items linked from the subscription resources licensed by the University Libraries. We cannot scan from photocopies. For copyright compliance, we need the original source.

You can link to library e-journals and database content but cannot, typically, place material on D2L or your course website (i.e. you cannot save a pdf of an article from a database and put it on D2L).

To do this, you must provide a PURL, or persistent URL, to the item. See the guide Links to Library Databases and E-Journals for instructions or ask a librarian -- library@usd.edu -- if you have any questions.

When instructors have completed the Course Reserves Form and fair use has been determined or copyright permission has been obtained, faculty and staff may post digital copies of copyrighted material to D2L.

Scanned copies of copyrighted works, regardless of the format of the original works, must include a proper copyright notice and attribution. The University Libraries Copyright Policy provides the following guidelines for instances of copying of materials that fall within the scope of fair use:

• One article from a journal or one article from a newspaper (if a digital version is not available through one of the library's licensed content providers).
• One chapter from a book.
• An excerpt from a prose work, so long as the excerpt does not exceed 10% of the work.
• One chart, graph, diagram, drawing, cartoon, or picture per book or per journal issue.

Please note that the aforementioned guidelines are merely guidelines and, although they have been incorporated into many university policies on copyright compliance, they have not been adopted by any court. Fair use is a flexible doctrine that is context driven. To aid you in determining whether a particular use constitutes fair use, you may make use of the Fair Use Checklist.

Digital copies of copyrighted works placed on D2L should be made from the original works, owned or approved for purchase by the library.

Faculty or staff may fill out the Course Reserves Form or contact us at eres@usd.edu or 605-677-5349.

A complete citation and the following copyright notice must be attached to each copyrighted work posted in D2L:

"The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted materials. Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research. If electronic transmission of reserve material is used for purposes in excess of what constitutes "fair use," that user may be liable for copyright infringement."