Reading lists: a guide for academic staff

The library can provide digitised copies of book chapters and journal articles as PDFs added to your reading list. This is particularly helpful to students when the library is unable to purchase an ebook and may not have sufficient copies of the book. It is also useful for providing access to journal articles which are not already available in the internal library collection or on Open Access. 

A digitisation can be requested for a single chapter or up to 10% of a book (whichever is greater) or an article from an issue of a journal. Where the library does not have access to either a physical or digital copy of a requested resource, we can request a copy via the British Library.

We are subject to limitations relating to copyright, and not all publishers and jurisdictions are covered. When you submit a request, Library staff will check the availability of the item for you.

How to request a digitisation

• First add the book or journal, which contains the chapter or article you want to digitise, to your reading list.
• Next to the book/journal, click on the three vertical dots to the right to select Request digitisation.

• Complete the form and the system will carry out a series of checks for copyright compliance.
  • Select the appropriate resource type, either Book or Journal Article.
  • Enter the bibliographic details for the item you wish to be scanned and click Next.
  • The start and end date fields will be fixed to cover the duration of the academic year. 
  • 'Needed by' - you can enter a date to indicate to the scanning team that the digitisation will be required for teaching by a certain date.
  • Enter the course name, course code and student numbers (this may already be populated based on the module data).
  • The system displays your name and email address.
• Select Submit.

What happens next?

• The CLA Copyright Permissions Checker works in the background to ensure that the requested item can be digitised. This takes a matter of seconds.
• If the digitisation is approved the Scanning Team will create the scan and add it to the reading list system so it links with the item entry on your reading list. 
• You will receive a system-generated email to inform you when the scan has been added or if it had to be rejected for reasons of copyright.
• As soon as the request is made the status will change to 'Digitisation pending'.