Course Reserves

Owned by Erin Nettifee
Last updated: Sept 23, 2024
3 min read

What are Course Reserves?

Course Reserves refers to required reading, viewing, or listening materials for a particular course, which are placed on Reserve at the request of the instructor. These materials may be physical (e.g., a book or music score) and held at a specific library on campus, or electronic (e.g., a journal article, e-book, or digitized streaming video) available via the course site on Canvas.

Through the Libraries, materials are placed on Reserve so that they are readily and equitably available to all students in the given course.

  • Physical items are typically available for short (3-hour) loans, to allow multiple students to use them in a given day. This includes the Top Textbooks program.

  • Placing electronic materials on Reserve through the Libraries minimizes risk of copyright infringement. Examples include verifying content’s licensing, requesting additional licenses for an item if needed, or requesting additional copyright permissions. Requests for digitized print and media must come through the Libraries and adhere to strict copyright standards for Fair Use.

  • Materials not currently owned or licensed by the Libraries that are needed for Reserves may be requested for purchase.

How to Get Started with Course Reserves in Canvas

Enable the Course Reserves Tool

  • Log into your course in Canvas.

  • From Settings (bottom left sidebar), choose Navigation (upper tab) and scroll down to find Course Reserves in the list of available Tools. Click the vertical ellipsis [⋮] and select Enable.

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Step 1: Settings
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Step 3: Tools

  • Make sure to SAVE your changes by clicking the blue button at the bottom of the page.

  • You can now also drag and drop to reorder where Course Reserves appears in your course navigation sidebar.

Create a Reading List

A course Reading List includes required materials for the given course. This could include books, textbooks, CDs, journal articles, DVDs - even websites. Each individual item or resource on the list is called a Citation. A single course in Canvas could include multiple reading lists, if desired by the instructor.

  • Log into your course in Canvas.

  • Choose Course Reserves in the left sidebar.

  • Here, you can choose either to Create list to create a new list from scratch, or, if you have taught a course in the last two years that used Course Reserves, you will also have the option to copy a list from a past course.

If you want to start a new list (or do not have old lists to reuse) click Create new list.

Note that you will be prompted to specify the location for any physical Course Reserves materials you request for that Reading List: Perkins, Music, or Lilly Library at Bishop’s House.

See Add Citations below to begin adding items to your list.

If you want to reuse an existing Reading List from a past semester, choose Select existing list.

  • From My lists, click Duplicate list for the list you wish to reuse.

  • Leganto will copy the name of the previous list and add the current semester to the name. You can change this on this screen, or later on if you prefer. Make sure to specify where your Reserves should be managed - Perkins Library, Music Library, or Lilly Library at Bishop’s House.

  • Select Create list to duplicate your past list for your course. You will be able to add, edit, or remove items from the list as needed.

 

Add Citations [Resources] to a Reading List

There are multiple ways to add citations to your Reading List in Canvas. Click the blue +Add button to add items by searching the library catalog, adding the item’s ISBN, or manually entering the item’s information. You can also choose to use the Cite It! widget.

Physical items (books, music scores, DVDs, CDs, etc) can be placed on reserve at Perkins, Music, or Lilly at Bishop’s House. These are typically 3-hour loans. The Citations for items that are physically on loan at a Library will be visible to students via Canvas.

To add a physical item:

  • In your Canvas course site, click Course Reserves in the left sidebar to access your Reading List.

  • Click the blue +Add button and choose Search the library.

  • Search for the title. Once found, click the Blue + button on the right, then click Add at the bottom right.

  • You will receive a confirmation message that the item was added to your Reading List and the Citation was sent to the library for processing.

Note: choosing Add & Edit allows you to see additional details, including whether there are online copies available through the Libraries that you might want to add instead. You also have options such as to add Notes and Tags, or to request digitization by the Libraries (see “Digitization Requests of print materials held by the Libraries” below).

You can add electronic resources like electronic books and journal articles owned by the Libraries to your reading list.

To add an electronic item:

  • In your Canvas course site, click Course Reserves in the left sidebar to access your Reading List.

  • Click the blue +Add button and choose Search the library.

  • Search for the title. You will see in the search results whether the item is labeled as electronic. Once found, click the Blue + button on the right, then click Add at the bottom right.

You may request that print materials held by the Libraries be digitized for your students to access electronically through Canvas (also known as e-reserves). This might be a book chapter or a journal article. The Libraries will not scan articles or book chapters that are available through the Libraries' electronic databases. Instead, the URLs will be placed on Reserve and made available through Canvas. See “Electronic Resources liscensed through the Libraries” above.

Note that copyright law limits the amount of material we can copy for Reserves.

To request a PDF scan of print materials held by the Libraries:

  • In your Canvas course site, click Course Reserves in the left sidebar to access your Reading List.

  • Click the blue +Add button and choose Search the library.

  • Search for the title. Once found, click the Blue + button on the right, then click Add & Edit at the bottom right.

  • Click Add & Edit, then choose the Item Actions tab. Scroll to the bottom for Library Services and click on Request Digitization:

  • Specify the Chapter(s) or Page Range(s) needed for your course, as well as any notes for the Libraries.

  • Click Send to submit to a course reserve coordinator for evaluation and processing. They will add the PDF scan to your Reading List to make it available to your students through Canvas.

Send a Reading List to the Libraries

Once you’ve prepared your Reading List, it will still be in a Draft status and will not yet be available to course reserve coordinators or visible to students. To send your Reading List to the Libraries for processing, click the My list is ready button in the top banner.

The pop-up box also gives the option to check a box to “Also publish the list to students” and it notes that “You can always publish the list later”. For the purposes of physical course reserves we recommend you do NOT check this box. Once your list has been processed by a course reserve coordinator it will be published and made available to students.

When a Reading List has been sent to the Libraries for processing, you will see this confirmation in the top banner. As you add more items to your list or make changes, you will need to click My list is ready each time so that the Libraries are notified.

For more, see:

View Current Availability of Reserves Requests

Requested Reserve materials might indicate a number of statuses when viewed in the Course Reserves section of Canvas:

  • Complete indicates that an item is ready for students to access.

  • Library Processing indicates that library staff need to do some processing work on the item before it is available for students to access.

  • Draft indicates that you have not Sent sent your list to the Libraries for processing. Do so by clicking My List is Ready. See

Send a Note to the Libraries

On the item level: Once a citation has been entered, you can communicate with the Libraries about it with any comments or requests. Click on the Full Details link on any item and navigate to the Library Discussion tab. Type your message and click Send. When a library staff member responds, you’ll receive a notification and the full conversation will be viewable in the Library Discussion area.

General comments or questions can also be sent to the Libraries from the Library Discussion icon from the Lists View. [need screenshot]

Request a Purchase

We will purchase books, e-books and textbooks for course reserves when possible.

Please allow extra time for ordering, shipping and cataloging when an item must be purchased. Items that must be purchased from international sources may arrive with significant delays.

Please be aware that many commercially available e-books are not available for purchase by libraries. This is generally true for materials produced by most textbook publishing houses.

Course Reserves not using Canvas

Canvas is the best place for your students to access Course Reserves, and the easiest way for Instructors to place materials on Reserve. If you are not using Canvas for your course, the Libraries are able to support reserve requests, but for physical items only. All electronic reserves (PDFs, e-books, online journal articles) will be handled through Canvas.

Need Additional Assistance?

Perkins Course Reserves

Jeremy Martin
perkins-reserves@duke.edu
(919) 660 - 5887

 

Lilly Library at Bishop’s House Course Reserves

David Felton
lilly-requests@duke.edu
(919) 660-5954

 

Music Course Reserves

Sarah Griffin
music-requests@duke.edu
(919) 660-6937

 

Documentation for Libraries Staff