Library Services

Reserves - Guidelines for Faculty and Instructors

The Social Science Reference Library provides both an electronic reserves service and print reserves services for faculty, instructors, TAs, and other instructional staff who teach classes in the Social Science Building.

Print Reserves: Books

  1. Instructors may drop off personal copies of books at the Circulation Desk and fill out a green "Reserves Form." (NOTE: all reserves are kept safely behind the circulation desk).
  2. Or, submit a list of library-owned books. The library will request the books from the campus libraries that own the books, and place them on reserve at the Social Science Library. NOTE: In a few cases, some campus libraries will not lend their books for reserves. Those books must be placed on reserve only at the library of origin. The librarian will notify you if that is the case for your reserves book request.
  3. Books can be given a 2 hour or 3 day reserve loan period.

Print Reserves: Articles

  1. Make clean, single-sided, individualy-paperclipped photocopies of the readings to be placed on reserve.
  2. Please be sure to include source attribution on your paper copy. This would include at least the author, the book or journal title, the pages, and publication year. Anthing already printed on the photocopy need not be repeated, and handwritten source attributions are perfectly fine.
  3. NOTE: The library cannot do photocopying due to the cost of the paper.
  4. Drop off the readings at at the Social Science Library's Circulation Desk, and fill out the green "Reserves Form."
  5. Like books, paper articles to be used for "hard copy reserve" can be given a 2 hour or 3 day reserve loan period.
  6. Or, your photocopies can also be used for scanning into e-reserves PDFs.

E-Reserves: Additional Instructions

For electronic reserves, the library staff will:

  1. We will scan your photocopies (see above) and convert them into PDF files.
  2. And then we will also submit them to the UW Madison reserve database in the MyUW Portal.
  3. Students will be able to access the electronic reserve readings through their MyUW portal under the "Learning" tab.
  4. Faculty/Instructors will be able to access the electronic reserve readings through their MyUW portal under the "Teaching" tab.
  5. Please allow at least 3-4 full days for processing electronic reserves.
  • NOTE: The library can not do scanning from the original book due to the scanner type.
  • NOTE: Due to copyright restrictions, the library is now barred from scanning a list of articles that reproduces the list of articles that make up a class reader bound and sold by the copy center.

Contact Tom Durkin or call 262-7340 if you need more information regarding reserves services.

Please consult these helpful web pages regarding copyright guidelines and fair-use.


Reserves - Information for Students

  • Print reserve readings can generally be checked out at the Circulation Desk for two hours.
  • Most electronic reserve readings can be accessed through the MyUW portal under the "Learning" Tab.
  • Some classes offer both electronic and print readings, and reserves may be kept at several libraries.
  • If you have any questions, please contact the library. We are happy to help. Please send questions or comments to Tom Durkin or call 262-7340.