Paul Rudd Information Professional

expertise gained through experience

University of Bath Library Scanning Service

by  on 

 

The visit included a meeting with the following:

  • Tom Brumfit (Information Librarian: Delivery)
  • Claire Tylee (Bibliographic Services Librarian)
  • Steve Alston (Serials & E-Resources Librarian)

Reasons for visit

To find out more about the library’s integration with the Learning Management System(LMS/VLE), and in particular to discover more about the following key areas:

  • The procedure and issues involved in scanning documents to add to the LMS

The University of Bath has a CLA HE copyright licence and in order to comply with the copyright regulations, and the possibility of an audit being conducted robust measures need to be in place to show the following: (after it has been confirmed that the item is able to be scanned under the terms of the CLA licence)

  • What document has been scanned and placed on the LMS
  • For what course
  • The course duration (i.e. one semester etc)
  • The number of students/delegates on the course

Under the terms of this CLA licence their needs to be one person designated as responsible for scanning copyright protected material. The (CLA) licence grants limited permission to designated persons (i.e. library staff) to scan copyright protected publications for use in teaching. Subsequently, only the designated person/s can scan items to be made available for the LMS.

Other College staff within the institution should not in any circumstances scan and place material on the LMS as this would be a breach of the CLA licence.

The designated staff in the Library at the University of Bath perform the following function:

  • Check copyright compliance,
  • Add mandatory copyright notices, and
  • Keep the records required by the licence.

Day to day issues involved in the offering a scanning service

Although the University of Bath have an online form for their scanning service they still can get requests in all manner of ways which includes the following:

  • Email
  • Handing in photocopied pages (this is uncommon but happens)

The procedure for verifying if the material is able to be placed on the VLE/LMS is one of the lengthiest in the Library and often staff have to contact the CLA for confirmation on what to do. Due to this the University advertises a  4 week turnaround – from request for a scan – to the time the request will be fulfilled and added to the VLE/LMS.