The Importance of Learning the Difference Between Copyright and Wrong

Copyright impacts all aspects of librarianship and most aspects of the wider information professions, yet courses that specifically address the legal rights and limitations of U.S. Federal Copyright law are not well represented in Library and Information Science (LIS) curriculum (Cross & Edwards, 2011; Schmidt & English, 2015). Studies have found a lack of copyright familiarity let alone literacy among librarians and LIS students surrounding many important copyright topics regarding open licensing, orphan works, and digital institutional repositories (Estell & Saunders, 2016; Saunders & Estell, 2019). The recent update to ALA’s Core Competencies has added additional copyright focused language to note that librarians should have foundational skills to “Understand the legal framework in which libraries operate, including laws relating to copyright and fair use…” (ALA, 2023). The need for this material is quite clear and yet many library and LIS programs have not addressed this notable gap in their curriculum. This panel of copyright experts, researchers, and course instructors is designed to help identify the roadblocks that have led to a dearth of copyright focused courses, and to opportunities for change using existing resources. The aim of this panel is to inspire all in attendance to work with in their institutions to advocate for more copyright focused instruction throughout LIS. The panel will consist of five brief five-minute talks from all panelists followed by a moderated discussion with the audience to map out the limitations and opportunities of copyright education for already existing LIS curriculum. The panel will close with a presentation of resources that can be used to improve copyright education including open educational resources and other no-cost material. Closing the session, the panelists will ask audience members to share their contact information, to provide continued support in bringing curricula change to their home programs or departments. We hope this panel will help create a community around this topic and become a regular topic at ALISE and similar conferences.