Electronic Course Packs
Charge
What are the advantages of electronic course packs for the instructor and for the students ? Investigate copyright issues related to electronic course packs. Develop a procedure for faculty to create electronic course packs, with minimum effort required on the part of the faculty. Address support requirements for such a procedure.
Interim Conclusions
The task force studied many aspects of the implementation of electronic course packs. Electronic Course Packs, also called "Course Readers", have been designed to be able to allow student access to a virtual library reserve desk, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, by replacing the traditional copies of course readings that are on reserve in the library with electronic copies of these course materials. Electronic course packs were introduced by Prof. Nancy Perkins and have been successfully used during the 1997 - 1998 academic year, for example in Health and Society 301 (http://www.rochester.edu/College/hls/hls301np/PREFACE.HTM) and in Religion and Classics 102. In order to access the Course Reader, the student must be enrolled in the course, and have obtained a password from the course instructor. The Course Readers are for "class room" use only.
The primary goal of the course pack task force is to develop a procedure of producing electronic course packs that are transparent to the faculty. Issues related to copyright were also studied and it was concluded that electronic course packs are covered by the "fair-use" policy, as long as their access is password restricted, and appropriate copyright warnings are posted.
The library appears to be ready to participate in a pilot program to provide electronic reserves to all participants of the 1998 summer institute, provided that funds are made available to purchase the required the equipment. The library will be responsible for the electronic conversion of the required documents and making copies of these documents available on the electronic reserve WEB server. All links to the electronic reserves will be through the Voyager Course Reserve button, where students will find everything that is on reserve, whether electronic or not.