The Mina Rees Library is excited to announce our new reserves management system! Beginning with the Spring 2021 term, all course reserves items will be made available using our new E-Reserves system instead of the library catalog.
Why? Managing our reserves materials outside of the library catalog will allow us to incorporate e-books that are licensed for all CUNY campuses, in addition to GC-only materials. The new system also prepares us to offer additional services in the future (like scanning materials in our collection) when library personnel regain access to our physical collections. It also opens up new options for integrating reserves items in Blackboard.
As always, details about placing items on reserve can be found on our Course Reserves Guide.
Note: The priority deadline for Spring 2021 reserves requests is January 8, 2021. Items requested after this date will be processed on a first-come, first-served basis and may not be available before the start of the term.
What kinds of materials can be placed on Reserve?
As for Fall 2020, the Library will do our best to fulfill all Spring 2021 requests with online materials. If a book is available as an e-book the library will add it to our collection (as our budget allows). We do not have the capability to purchase new streaming videos, but we will help locate library-licensed audiovisual materials that may be available for course use through our existing database subscriptions. Instructors should use the Course Reserve Request Form to submit requests for:
- E-books
- E-book chapters
- Streaming videos – for materials already licensed by the library
Where will students find Reserve items?
- Course reserves lists in our new E-Reserves system will be made available in January.
- Each course will have its own password-protected page to list and access materials.
- Course instructors will inform students of the password. Library personnel are NOT permitted to share passwords with students.
- Reserve e-books that are added to our collection will still appear in OneSearch, but titles will no longer show course information on the item record.
What if there is no e-book version of a text?
Please bear in mind that some textbooks are simply unavailable to libraries as e-books. Faculty may consult with their subject librarian to explore alternatives for their courses. For information about Open Educational Resources (OER) or assistance with creating a Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) course, see our OER Guide.
Questions? Ask a librarian or contact Reserves.
This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.
Roxanne Shirazi is assistant professor and dissertation research librarian at the CUNY Graduate Center, where she also serves as project director for the CUNY Digital History Archive and oversees the college’s institutional archives. 
Yes, for the most part licensed streaming videos are available in OneSearch! We have some brief tips for finding streaming videos in OneSearch on our Film Studies research guide. We still have some wrinkles to iron out due to our recent system migration, but hopefully this will get you started! And you are always welcome to contact us for assistance with detailed searches.
Thanks so much for this helpful article.
I wonder if there is any way to search for particular titles of streaming video before asking to put them on reserve? Then we would know in advance if they are available and licensed by the library.