News

Academic Senate warns professors about violating copyright law

A presentation raised ethical questions at the last Academic Senate meeting, revealing that not only students have been guilty of violating copyright law but also professors.

During the presentation Tracey Mayfield, the Associate Dean of the University Library at Cal State Long Beach, said that faculty are expected to hold themselves to the same standards as students when using copyrighted materials.

“There really seems to be, in some cases, a disconnect with some of the faculty between coming down like 10 tons of you-know-what on a student for plagiarizing, but you’re showing them stuff on the computer where you downloaded illegal software, or you’re handing out multiple copies of a short story by somebody that you didn’t get permission from,” Mayfield said. “To me, it all falls under the same umbrella, the plagiarism, intellectual property and copyright. It all falls under this umbrella of information ethics, and they’re not situational ethics.”

The Doctrine of Fair Use sets guidelines for what activities are protected from copyright litigation “such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship and research,” according to the U.S. Copyright Office website.

However, copyright law is written vaguely, and it is often difficult to determine what use of what items requires copyright clearance, according to Mayfield and Stanford University Library’s website.

“Unfortunately, the only way to get a definitive answer on whether a particular use is a fair use is to have it resolved in federal court,” according to the Stanford University Library’s website.

In order to clear up the copyright issue, Mayfield created a guide available on the University Library website for faculty to use and protect themselves from potential lawsuits. Mayfield said publishers cannot legally file suit against public institutions but can still target individuals.

“The whole point of having the guide is so that not everybody on campus has to become a fair use scholar,” she said. “They just need enough to be able to cover their butts, and that’s what this is about.”

The biggest concern includes professors who, without obtaining permission, post full articles on personal websites that they use to hold resources for their students, Mayfield said. Using links to the information instead of posting the entire publication is an easy way around this problem, according to the University Library’s online guide to copyright.

Most articles posted on Beachboard are protected under the Doctrine of Fair Use because they are password protected and only available to a specified group, according to the University Library’s online guide.

However, professors who compile course packets last-minute through independent copy companies create another copyright problem, Mayfield said.

“When you do that, you’re basically saying you know they aren’t getting copyright clearance, and I’ll be responsible for that,” Mayfield said. “And you’re breaking the [Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)], so now you’re a felon twice.”

According to the IDEA website, public institutions have to meet the National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard, meaning they must provide source files that can be developed into other formats, including braille or audio books, for students with disabilities.

“That’s another federal law that says you will turn things in ahead of time so that students have the ability to have it made accessible in whatever way they need it,” Mayfield said. “It’s not just books, articles and everything else. They have to be able to make everything accessible.”

For more information on copyright compliance, visit csulb.libguides.com/copyrightforfaculty?hs=a to see Mayfield’s online guide.

You may also like

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More in:News