Q. Hello,
I am a research assistant working for the Indigenous Child Welfare Research Network at UVic. Our organization provides a number of services for Indigenous people, agencies and communities, including helping to facilitate research for these groups.
One of the challenges that we have experienced at UVic, is gaining access for non-UVic affiliated people to the library and most importantly, the library databases. I recently met with the copyright specialist at UVic, and learned that we are able to offer daily passes to anyone who physically comes into the library, allowing them to access not only the physical library items, but also all of the online databases.
While this is a wonderful service that we can notify people about, many people, agencies and communities are not located near the Victoria area, and so we thought it would be good to gather information from other universities around the province to see if a similar service is offered. That way, if people, agencies or communities are doing research, we can direct them to the closest university library that allows them temporary access to online databases.
So, I am inquiring:
1. Do you offer a service for non-university affiliated people to access your online databases?
2. Is this service available on or off campus?
3. How long is this service offered to an individual?
4. Is this service renewable?
Thank you for any help that you can offer me.
Warmest regards,
Graduate Research Assistant
Indigenous Child Welfare Research Network
Human and Social Development
University of Victoria
A. Hello,
Thank you for your inquiry.
1. Yes, we do offer limited access to online resources to non-SFU affiliated persons.
http://www.lib.sfu.ca/my-library/services-for-you/external
There are really 2 options. The first is exactly the same situation as you describe at UVIC. It’s a one day guest access where users can obtain a temporary login to use the online resources while visiting one of our campus library locations in person.
The other option is to obtain an External Borrower card (for a fee) which extends borrowing privileges for some of our materials.
http://www.lib.sfu.ca/my-library/services-for-you/borrowing#External
Please note that due to licensing restrictions, neither option allows for remote access to our electronic materials.
Persons with a public library card from a major urban public library system (such as Vancouver Public Library or even Burnaby Public Library or others) may also want to investigate whether their local public library has access to similar databases that they can access remotely using their public library card account.
2. As mentioned, non-affiliated persons and guests can only access our online resources from computers inside one of our libraries where that is allowed in our licenses for electronic resources.
3. One day guest access is free and valid until the end of the day. Guests will need to obtain a new guest account for each visit. If you’re interested in an external borrower’s card, then that option would generate a login ID and password for you to use within our library locations that would be valid for the duration of the card (4 months is $35, 1 year is $100).
4. We don’t have any limits on daily guest access so long as guests follow our code of conduct and agree to the terms of use each time they request a guest login. An external borrower’s card is renewable at the same rates: $35 for 4 months or $100 for a year.
Thank you for your interest. Let me know if you have any additional questions.
Sandra Wong, Electronic Resources Librarian