September 21, 2020 FAC/STAFF

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Supporting students through Digital Textbook Sharing

The Library is implementing a new controlled digital lending (CDL) program called Digital Textbook Sharing (information can be found here: https://researchguides.jcu.edu/textbooksharing/digital), which we hope can replicate some of the access to content that our Textbook Sharing Program had previously provided.

Conceptually, CDL allows us to digitize a physical copy of a book and electronically lend it to students for the same 2 hour checkout time as Textbook Sharing. Students will not be able to print or download these files. Once the physical book has been digitized, we must keep it in the library, locking it away so that no one can use it throughout the duration of the process. The philosophical idea behind this is that only one loanable copy still exists, it has just been temporarily shifted into an electronic format.

We would like to provide as many textbooks as we possibly can to students through this process, and one of the main ways we can achieve this goal is to reach out to see if there are any departmental or Faculty copies of current textbooks that can be shared with the Library. And just a reminder that these items would not be able to be returned until the end of each book’s time as part of the Digital Textbook Sharing program. Any help that you can provide would be much appreciated. We will scan the items as quickly as our workflow allows so that they are available to the students as soon as possible, and we will update the book list (located here: https://researchguides.jcu.edu/textbooksharing/digital) when the digital files are ready to be checked out. Questions?: email us at circulation@jcu.edu