Copyright

              Do This                                  Not That

In General:

Use the D2L learning management system to

organize your course materials and make

them available to students. This ensures that appropriate security and authentication measures are in place for access to restricted content.

Refrain from posting copyrighted materials on a website that can be viewed by someone not enrolled in the course.  Even if the site is password-protected, you may be at risk of a copyright violation. 

You may provide access to copyrighted materials only to students registered for the course and other instructional staff (teaching assistants or guest lecturers, for example) throughout the academic term.

Do not allow anyone not enrolled in the course to have access to copyrighted materials, including other MTC students. Instructional staff (teaching assistants or guest lecturers, for example). Do not extend student access beyond the end of the academic term.

Fair Use guidelines stipulate that copyrighted works may be used “in support of curriculum-based instructional activity.”  This can be demonstrated most clearly if the resources are included within course modules that integrate associated readings, discussion questions, assignments, and related materials.                                                         

Do not provide access to copyrighted materials if they are not justifiably in support of clearly articulated learning outcomes.

Provide attribution for both the original creator and the copyright holder (these may be different entities) when using the work of others.

Do not assume that if materials lack a copyright notice © they need not be cited or are in the public domain.  (They do and they probably are not.)

Whenever possible, link to materials that already reside online.  

Do not link to works that appear to have been posted illegally by someone else.

        Do This                               Not That

Documents:

Limit the use of these resources to one article per journal issue and/or one chapter of a particular book. You do not need to restrict the total number of articles or book chapters (from multiple sources) used in a course, however. 

Do not scan or otherwise reproduce multiple book chapters or an entire journal so that students can avoid paying for these resources.

Rather than uploading documents to D2L, link to online resources that are available through the Library’s extensive collection of digital resources.

Typically, these items can be linked directly to your D2L course.

Do not upload documents that you have downloaded (or otherwise duplicated) from the MTC Library's collections or licensed subscription resources.

Video and Audio:

Identify the portion of the work that is relevant to the lesson objectives and create a clip of that segment for students to view or listen to. Use the least amount that meets the educational need.

Unless it is your original creation or in the public domain, reconsider making an entire video, podcast, or audio recording available if students only need to watch/listen to part of the work.

Embed video clips in your course using the embed tool in D2L or by using “embed code” links, where provided.

Reconsider uploading a video file into D2L for students to view and/or download. Not only is this legally problematic, but the file sizes will make student viewing more difficult. Use a link if possible.

Images:

Generally, you may use up to 10% of the images (e.g., charts, illustrations, or photographs) from a published work, with a maximum of 15 from that publication.

Do not assume that because an image is available online or its original is no longer protected by copyright you can freely use a copy of that image.

You may use some images such as company logos that are protected by trademark law for educational purposes to identify a product, for example, but you should attribute

them to the trademark owner.

Do not use company logos without a justifiable instructional reason to do so. Decorating your D2L site with your favorite professional team logo, for example, is not recommended.