Circulation
Student-Patron Circulation Policy
The University of Detroit Mercy ("UDM") Law Library provides open-stacks access for all faculty and staff of the university, students, alumni, and the general public. If you are unable to locate a book in the stacks, check the online catalog to see whether another patron has already checked out the book.
Members of the UDM community with appropriate authentication have check-out privileges for most library materials.* Bring items you want to borrow from the library to the Circulation Desk to be checked out.
Students:
- Your name must be listed in our circulation records; if it is not listed, you will need to obtain confirmation that you are a registered student from the Registrar. You must also provide to the library staff at circulation a picture identification in order to check out materials.
- Up to six circulating items may be checked out by law students for a period of 98 days or 14 weeks, except that all library materials are due on the date of a graduating student's last final exam.**
- Student borrowing privileges are suspended when: (a) a student has an item that is more than seven days overdue or (b) a student has more than one overdue item. Any student who fails to return all library materials checked out to them upon graduation will not be eligible for alumni borrowing privileges.
Alumni:
- Your name must be listed in our circulation records; if it is not listed, you will need to obtain confirmation that you are a graduate of UDM Law School from alumni services. You must also provide to the library staff at circulation a picture identification in order to check out materials.
- Up to two circulating items may be checked out by alumni for a period of four weeks. Materials may be renewed once for a period of two weeks.
- Unless alternative arrangements are made with library staff prior to an item's due date, your borrowing privileges will be permanently terminated if you fail to return a book or pay for its replacement within 72 hours of a late notice or 48 hours of an item recall.
Any item may be recalled after the initial borrower has had it for two weeks. The Law Library also reserves the right to recall an item before two weeks if warranted by special circumstances. Recall requests are handled at the Circulation Desk.
All borrowings may be renewed once in person by telephone or via email. If a member of the library staff does not respond to an email renewal, the item has not been renewed. Students must present an item to Circulation in order to renew it a second time and for any subsequent renewals. If student is unwilling to present an item to Circulation for renewal as required, it will be deemed a "Missing Book." The Missing Book designation also applies to any book reported as lost and any book that library staff cannot locate withina reasonable period of time.
To return a book, you must give it to a member of the library staff at the Circulation Desk.
No fines are charged for overdue materials. Students and patrons will be charged for Missing Books only. Failure to pay for a lost item in a timely fashion will result in suspended or terminated borrowing privileges, depending on whether the borrower is a student or an alumnus. Charges for lost items cover the actual replacement cost of the item, plus a $25.00 processing fee. If an item's value cannot be ascertained, students and alumni will be required to pay to the Library Development Fund a replacement fee of $75.00, plus the $25.00 processing fee.
Library materials may be used by the general public within the library. Members of the public who wish to use reserve material while in the Law Library must allow library staff to first check out the item to a generic patron card so that the Law Library can track usage of its reserve items.
Patron records at the UDM Law Library are protected from disclosure. Information concerning names, borrowing records, addresses, etc. will not be released to any other individual or organization absent a court order. Moreover, the borrowing record for any item is permanently deleted from UDM Law Library's system upon the item's return. The Library Staff may, however, add information notes (in the notes field) into borrowers' records. Notes are generally related to topics such as a patron behaving in an inappropriate manner or comments on a patron's Missing Books.
*Please note: students and faculty from other UDM campuses must request materials through interlibrary loan - they may not borrow. Although, occasionally, with the Director's permission, courtesy library cards are issued to people not affiliated with the law school.
Faculty Circulation Policy for Print Materials
Faculty members of the University of Detroit Mercy ("UDM") Law School community, and instructors and adjunct faculty ("Faculty"), have check-out privileges. Faculty may check out materials for up to one year. All borrowings must be recorded by library staff at Circulation.
After fourteen days, all materials loaned to any patron are subject to immediate recall if needed by a member of the UDM Law School community. The Law Library also reserves the right to recall an item before two weeks if warranted by special circumstances. If a book is recalled, a Faculty member may request that the library limit the subsequent patron loan and place the book on hold for the Faculty member.
All borrowings may be renewed in person, by telephone, or via email. If a librarian or other member of the library staff does not respond to an email renewal, the item has not been renewed. Although Faculty need not renew items in person, they must present to Circulation any item requiring repair or supplement updates in a timely manner.
Because Faculty often check out items for extended periods, and faculty and other patrons have commented on the age of some due dates listed in our catalog, at the end of each Spring Term, the library will send to all Faculty a list of all the items that they have checked out and ask them to:
- review the list;
- return any items that they no longer need; and
- renew any book that they still need by telephone, via an email to Katie Cooper at cooperkt@udmercy.edu, Kathryn Gordon at gordonke@udmercy.edu, or Gene Moy at moyg@udmercy.edu, or in person.
Any Faculty member with ten or more checked-out items or who has had any item for two years or more will be asked to comply with the process outlined above before checking out new items. Hopefully, this policy will make it easier for Faculty, students, and other patrons to locate more efficiently the materials they need.
Course Reserves
Course reserves are designed to enable professors to make limited quantities of course-related materials available to students in an efficient way. All requests for service need to be submitted in writing.
Course Reserves requests are processed in order of receipt. A minimum of three working days is necessary for processing traditional reserve materials. If a Course Reserves form includes books, which are not in the UDM Law Library collection at the time the form is submitted, the books will be ordered and added to the collection; however, this process may take several weeks, during which the material will not be available. The circulation of course reserves is determined by the professor.
Non-Circulating Materials
Items that do not circulate include the following: reserves, monographic sets, loose-leaf publications, serials, and select DVDs and VHS.* Additionally, not all government documents circulate. Their circulation is determined by item type (i.e. government documents that are monographs do circulate, government documents that are loose-leaf publications do not circulate).
*UDM law professors are permitted to check-out non-circulating items.
Audio-Visual Equipment
The loan period for audio-visual equipment is dependent upon the needs of the students, professors or staff members. Requests for equipment must be submitted to the Audio-Visual Technician through the online request form located here.
Missing Items
If a patron has trouble locating an item on the shelf, a search card may be filled out for that item at the circulation desk. A member of the circulation staff will search for it within one business day. When the item is found the patron will be notified and the item will be placed on hold at the circulation desk.
Interlibrary Loan
Interlibrary loan is a service offered by the Law Library to aid students, faculty, and staff in research.* It is designed to complement the resources of the UDM Law Library, not to supply the major part of materials for extended research. Policies are based on the National Interlibrary Loan Code of the American Library Association and on the regulations of the individual lending libraries.
The time involved in processing interlibrary loan requests is dependent upon the nature of the material requested - esoteric materials may take longer to identify and if located at another library, often taking up to a month or more. More common titles may be obtained within a shorter period. The majority of items will arrive within two weeks of their request. The loan period is determined by the lending library. In most cases, the loan period is two weeks. Institutions that loan materials have the right to place restrictions on the use of their material (such as requiring it to be used within the Library) and may recall material at any time.
We try to accommodate all research needs, but during especially busy periods, we reserve the right to limit the number of requests that may be submitted at any one time to four per person.
*Please note: Interlibrary loan service is available for faculty, staff, and students ONLY.
Renewals
Items can be renewed up to two times, but only if they have not been requested by another patron. Interlibrary loans are limited to one renewal unless otherwise indicated.