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Open Reserves

What are Open Reserves?

The Open Reserves collection is designed as a browsable centralized point from which assigned print readings are made available to all members of a class for library use only (or check out) at faculty request.  The Open Reserves collection is located at the front of the Learning Commons on the main floor of the library.

Faculty submitting materials for reserve

To put an item on reserve for a course, you have two options: You can use our online form (Collins items only) to list the items and specify the conditions of the loan and other reserve information (we'll retrieve the items for you) OR you can bring the items to the Service Desk and fill out the printed form specifying the conditions of the loan.  Only books owned by Collins Memorial Library will be accepted for Open Reserves. 

These items are not accepted for Open Reserves:

  • DVDs (Contact your liaison librarian for streaming options)
  • Personal copies of books
    • (Unless Collins Library does not own the edition needed and your copy is donated to the library to add to the collection)
  • Faculty created anthologies
  • Summit books
  • Interlibrary Loan books

Turnaround time: Please allow 48 hours to process reserve materials.

I need to place a book or DVD on reserve

  • Books: Please email libref@pugetsound.edu with the item information.  We will try to recall the item or purchase an additional copy for the collection.
  • DVDs: While physical copies of DVDs are not placed on open reserve, please email your liaison librarian for streaming options.  

I need to place a book or DVD on reserve, but we don't have it in Collins Library

  • Please email your liaison librarian to assist you with obtaining materials for the library collection.
  • DVDs: While physical copies of DVDs are not placed on open reserve, please email your liaison librarian for streaming options. 

Faculty removing materials from Reserves

Service Desk staff will remove all Open Reserve materials at the end of each semester.

If an item needs to be removed prior to the end of the semester, please allow at least twenty-four hour notification, allowing library staff time to de-accession the material from the library system. All items will be returned to the library stacks.

To remove materials from Open Reserve, please email the course name and item title(s) to libref@pugetsound.edu.

Faculty placing copies on reserve

If you need scanned copies of materials available for your class, please use our OCR for Canvas service. OCR for Canvas is a collaborative effort between departmental administrative assistants, Collins Library, Student Accessibility and Accommodation, and faculty to ensure the accessibility of course readings made available to our students via Canvas.  OCR (optical character recognition) in documents supports the principles of universal design for learning.  Running scanned documents through an OCR application is critical for our students who use screen readers or text-to-speech software, and it makes texts searchable for all students.