The University Copyright Office and its Role within the Libraries

BY DONNA FERULLO

PILLARS: Campuswide Information Literacy, New Relationships to/with Disciplinary Faculty, Robust Research & Scholarship Program, Robust Local Collections

Copyright is the cornerstone of many of the Libraries Pillars. There are two sides to copyright — using other people’s copyrighted works and managing your own copyrighted works. The U.S. Copyright law is quite complex and can be difficult to interpret in the print world but the digital world has only increased the confusion for many in how copyright works. The University Copyright Office (UCO) is well placed within the Libraries to advise the Libraries and the University on challenges and opportunities posed by copyright. Below are a few examples of how copyright plays a role in the various Pillars.

Campuswide Information Literacy: Section Five of the ACRL Standards for Information Literacy is about the legal and ethical use of information. Many times it is referred to as copyright literacy. The UCO has a web site www.lib.purdue.edu/uco to help educate the Purdue University community on their rights and responsibilities as copyright owners and users. Several UCO publications are targeted specifically for students to educate them on how copyright impacts their research and scholarship at Purdue and in their future careers. I also work closely with Sharon Weiner to identify opportunities to highlight copyright literacy.

New Relationships to/with Disciplinary Faculty: Part of the faculty mission is to publish their research. Purdue allows faculty to retain the copyright in most of the works they create. Traditionally, faculty would assign the copyright in their works to publishers in exchange for their work to be published. Now, that is only one option. Faculty are much more proactive in managing their copyright. The UCO has created a brochure available both in print and online that provides information on various options on how to manage your copyright. I also consult with faculty on assignment of copyright agreements and recommend the attachment of the CIC author addendum as well as specific language suggestions to amend the contract as well as provide presentations to their classes and schools. It is so important for faculty to be aware of their rights and the UCO has made this a top priority in recent years. As part of this initiative, I am currently working with ARL to develop a document that explains how faculty can reclaim their copyrights that they assigned to publishers early in their careers. 

Robust Research & Scholarship Program: Data is the core of all research. Yet, controversy swirls around whether data is copyrightable. I recently attended a conference on data policy at Princeton University. Almost every speaker mentioned copyright but only in a peripheral way. Further conversation among participants revealed that many agreed that copyright plays a major role in data but no one can agree on how to address the issue. The UCO is collaborating with various individuals both internally and externally to research copyright and data.

Robust Local Collections: Copyright is at the front and center in developing all the Libraries collections. Archives and Special Collections must consider copyright in most of their decisions from deeds of gift to what they can and cannot digitize as well as who can have access to the collections. The institutional repository faculty and staff must constantly navigate the copyright maze to ensure that submissions are legal. The collection of databases that the Libraries provide access to are governed by licenses. Those licenses always have to be carefully scrutinized for fair use and interlibrary loan provisions. The Google project and the Haithi Trust also have many copyright issues.

The above is only a small sampling of how copyright is interwoven throughout many of the Libraries Pillars. The UCO is actively engaged in many initiatives within the Libraries, across the University, nationally and internationally to ensure that the rights granted by the U.S. Copyright law are fully utilized.

Graduating Seniors Honored

Guiding Principles: Provide excellent customer service

These 2010 graduating seniors were recognized by Dean Mullins for their dedicated service to the Purdue Libraries.

Nathan Ballard (IDPS)
Cody Chambers (PUP)
Nathan Crank (ENGR)
Isiah Hudson (IDPS)
Eugenia Hunter (HIKS)
Aaron Lam (HSSE)
Joe Lee (LIFE)
Jessamie Leonard (HKRP)
Jonathan Mabrito (IDPS)
Matthew Reichart (IDPS)
David Ruthsatz (AVTE)
Erika Salazar (UGRL)
Britney Young (HIKS)
Jonathan Yuan (EAS

A book, in recognition of their service to the Libraries, will be plated from the library in which they worked. Graduating students from other departments will have a book plated from HSSE’s collection. Each graduating student received a duplicate bookplate of the one to be placed in a book in their honor.

PILLAR: Campuswide Information Literacy & Robust Local Collections

On November 15 and 16, 2010, I helped coordinate a visit from the American Chemical Society (ACS) as part of their inaugural year of ACS on Campus events. Initiated by the Library Relations department of ACS Publications, ACS on Campus is an opportunity for librarians, faculty and students to dialogue about how the library can facilitate and aid faculty and student research. On the 15th, the program focused on scholarly publishing, with a panel of speakers discussing peer-review, ethics in publishing and tips for having your research published in scholarly journals. The panel included Tim Zwier, the M.G. Mellon Distinguished Professor of Chemistry from Purdue in his role as Senior Editor for The Journal of Physical Chemistry, Donna Minton, from ACS, who is the managing editor of The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters and me. A little over 30 students and faculty from chemistry, chemical engineering, pharmacy and other areas came to the panel and accompanying lunch to ask questions about the process a manuscript goes through from submission, to peer-review and (hopefully) publication. In my role as chemical information specialist, I emphasized the CIC Author Addendum, author’s rights, Purdue e-Pubs, bibliographic management software and ethics regarding research data.

The program on the 16th focused on alternative careers for chemists as well as a networking luncheon. Nearly 50 undergraduate and graduate students were in attendance to hear a panel led by Jan Kravitz, ACS career consultant. Participants on the panel included me (discussing academic librarianship), a sale representative from Chemical Abstracts Service, an intellectual property lawyer, a human resources manager from Dow AgroSciences and an entrepreneur. We each brought a variety of perspectives and enlightened the audience about non-traditional career paths in the chemical sciences. During the luncheon afterward, all of the panelists who stayed were swamped by students asking additional questions.

In addition to these two programs, ACS Publications and the Chemical Abstracts Service held focus groups with graduate students, post-docs and faculty to help them better understand how the participants use various ACS (and other) information resources in their day-to-day research as well as gather feedback on the particular services they provide. Jan Kravitz also offered resume reviews for approximately 15 graduate students.

Overall, these two days raised student and faculty awareness about a variety of issues while allowing the Libraries to be a part of the conversation. I found it both rewarding to participate and enlightening to hear the various concerns of the students.

More information can be found on the ACS on Campus Web site at: http://pubs.acs.org/page/4librarians/acsoc/index.html

PILLAR: Infrastructure

Each member of our faculty and staff needs to attend an ADA training session. To accommodate as many employees as possible, we have made arrangements for additional training times beyond the “Libraries only” sessions. Please choose one of these training times in January and register as directed below. Please note: I must track all Equal Opportunity, Equal Access (ADA) training. If you attend one of the general sessions, and not a Libraries only session, please let me know.

General Purdue Sessions:

Sessions for Supervisors Only
January 18, 7:30AM         PFSB 1179A/B Supervisors
January 18, 2:00PM         STEW B848 Supervisors — LIBRARIES ONLY SESSION
January 19, 9:30AM         ROSS #130 Supervisors
January 25, 2:00PM         PFSB 1179 A/B Supervisors
January 26, 4:00PM         PFSB 1179 A/B Supervisors
January 27, 8:00AM         PFSB A/B Supervisors

Sessions for Faculty and Staff, Non-supervisors
January 13, 7:00AM         BRNG 1222 Faculty and Staff      
January 20, 3:00PM         STEW 318 Faculty and Staff
January 25, 10:00AM       STEW B848 Faculty and Staff — LIBRARIES ONLY SESSION
January 27, 2:30PM         STEW 318 Faculty and Staff
January 28, 10:00AM       FREH 1-2 Faculty and Staff

Instructions to register:
Go to the link below. You will be at the Office of Institutional Equity home page. There will be an underlined link Phase II Briefing Sessions Scheduling & Registration. Click here. Log on using your Purdue user name and password.
http://www.purdue.edu/ethics/oie/EqualAccessEqualOpportunityBriefing.shtml

In Memoriam: Purdue Libraries Advocate Martha Jane Graham

Martha Jane Graham, 96, of West Lafayette passed away on November 29, 2010. Mrs. Graham graduated from Otterbein High School and received her bachelor of science in chemistry from Purdue University in 1935.

Martha was elected secretary of the Class of 1935, a role she continued to serve conscientiously throughout the next 75 years, updating class members with a newsletter annually. She became a liaison to the Libraries when the class selected the Libraries as the recipient of its 50th Anniversary gift in 1985. That gift was used to create the Libraries Scholars Program. She faithfully communicated with her classmates about the program, thus helping steward their gifts and keeping them in touch with the Purdue Libraries. In the last several years, she attended the Libraries Scholars Grant luncheons to represent her class.

Winter at Happy Hollow Park

Photo by Patrick Whalen, HSSE

Shop Purdue University Press Catalogs Online

Purdue University Press has a new Holiday 2010 Catalog which offers a 50% discount on selected titles from several of our signature areas including Purdue and Indiana, History, Agriculture and more. For a complete list of specials check the catalog at http://www.thepress.purdue.edu/pages/catalogs-leaflets.

Also, the Press has started an e-news program which allows interested people to fill out a simple online form and choose their preferred signature areas of interest. Periodic e-newsletters will be sent out regarding new titles, announcements, special sales, etc. of books and journals related to these signature areas. We invite you to sign-up today at www.thepress.purdue.edu/enews

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