 |
 |
Dear colleagues, Thank you to everyone who responded to my query about e-resources access for 'interrupting' students. The responses are summarised below. It seems to be a mixed picture really - some institutions allow access and others don't....I've not managed to get a response from JISC yet. I think this remains a grey area, and up to the discretion of individual institutions. I've decided that for now, interrupting students will only be entitled to access the e-resources via our walk-in user PC, until the situation can be better defined. Responses: - Our interrupted students are still allowed to access e-resources, but their Library borrowing is restricted to 5 items instead of the normal 10 (or 12 for final year students). - If interrupted to catch up with course work, then to cut of the e-resources would deny them the ability to catch up. If however interrupted for non-academic reasons, then probably not an issue. The bigger issue for us would be that if they are not paying fees they loose their id card and IT user account, so Athens will be the least of their problems! - If a student has paid a fee and this fee is not being reimbursed isn't there a contractual responsibility to supply the services they have paid for until the end of the contract period? So if a student intermits with the intention of returning next term/year and they have paid a fee for this term/year isn't the University obliged to provide those services or return a part of the fee paid? - we treat these students as a type of visitor during the suspension of their membership. We get the Head of their School to act as "sponsor" so that we retain some formal contact with the student and we give them a Library card with reduced borrowing privileges. We are an AthensDA site but we provide this category of student with a Classic Athens Access account with a limited IP Address range so their access is confined to on-campus only and so they effectively become "walk-in" users. - This comes up for us all the time as students take their degrees in chunks, and often take a break. Our E resources manager says that the licenses state that current means actively studying, and so we turn off access to students during breaks. Our students could quite easily be using the resources for other non academic uses. But many do get upset that they can not 'get ready' for the next chunk ahead of time. - I think we have a different interpretation of the situation of interrupted student. If they "interrupt" in the middle of an academic year we do nothing until their normal expiry date is reached. If they then don't re-register the following Septemer/October,then their entitlements to librfary borrowing, e resource access etc -are not renewed - on the grounds that technically they are NOT a registered student ( I think we do this partly because they are not reported to HESA in our student numbers count, and JISC banding is based on student fTEs....) Thanks again for all your responses. Regards, Kate Newell -------------------------------------------- E-Resources and Serials Team Leader Academic Services - Collections & Research Support University of Exeter Library Stocker Road Exeter Devon EX4 4PT Tel: 01392 269283 (internal x5283) E-mail: [log in to unmask] ________________________________ From: Newell, Kate Sent: 30 April 2008 11:13 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Advice re: e-resources access for 'Interrupting' students Dear colleagues, I was wondering if I could ask you what your policy is on access to library electronic resources for interrupting students, please? Technically, if a student interrupts their course of study, they are denied access to any University facilities (including library, IT etc) during their interruption. So, in theory, they would not be entitled to access library electronic resources. However, 'technically' they are still 'registered' students of the University....the advice I've received from Athens is that it all depends on licence agreements and how they can be interpreted. I've asked JISC for their advice, but in the meantime, it would be really useful to hear how other institutions deal with this issue - any advice would be gratefully received! I will happily post a summary for the list. Many thanks, Kate Newell -------------------------------------------- E-Resources and Serials Team Leader Academic Services - Collections & Research Support University of Exeter Library Stocker Road Exeter Devon EX4 4PT Tel: 01392 269283 (internal x5283) E-mail: [log in to unmask]