Books and media, both from the Libraries' or instructors' personal collections, may be placed on physical reserve for circulation at any of the three Libraries with a 3-hour or 2-day loan period, which is set by the course instructor. Faculty and staff receive 2-day loan periods for all reserve items. At the time of checkout, instructors may request longer loan periods (up to 2 weeks) for their reserve items to facilitate class preparation and in-class use of these materials. Material will remain on reserve for the current semester, and can be extended to future semesters, as needed.
To place items on physical reserve in one of the University Libraries, faculty may bring items directly to the University or Dewey Library Circulation Desk or request that reserves staff pull library items from the stacks.
All physical reserve requests must be submitted with a reserve request form. Use the Libraries’ online reserve request form, or download and print a reserve request form.
Instructors' personal copy items are physically processed to identify them as reserve items. This includes applying plastic book covers and adhering labels to items. The Library does not assume responsibility for replacing worn, damaged or missing personal copies. If you are not prepared for this risk, please do not put your personal property on reserve.
Items borrowed through Interlibrary Loan cannot be placed on course reserve.
If you are planning on assigning a book or video that is not owned by the Libraries or yourself, please contact your Subject Librarian to request that we purchase the title for our collection. Purchases will be made in accordance with the Library’s Collection Development Policy. Please note, the University Libraries will not purchase textbooks.
Please include course name and number, semester, and loan period (3-hour or 2-day).
Reserve requests are processed in the order in which they are received. Reserve materials are accepted throughout the semester. To ensure that all items needed are on reserve in time for your assignments, we recommend submitting reserve requests at least two weeks in advance. If the University Libraries must purchase an item requested for reserve, staff will do its best to obtain materials as quickly as possible, but some materials may take longer to obtain.
