The Office of Instructional and Research Technology

Who are we and what do we do?

We are university staff and part time instructors who are passionate about engaging students in their own learning, whether in the classroom, research laboratory, or their co-curricular lives. We do this by working with faculty and staff to encourage communication and collaboration among faculty, students, and staff through the use of modern technology.

How can we help you?

OIRT staff are knowledgeable about technology and pedagogy and how they interact. We believe that effective teaching and learning should drive technology choices, and not the other way around. Consequently, our focus is on creating learning environments that engage learners with each other and with course material.

Our office provides:

• Instructional design for face to face, hybrid, and fully online courses including individual and group consultation and training
• Development of customized ePortfolios for schools and units
• Video services including video production, video streaming, video on demand, Rutgers on iTunesU, the Rutgers YouTube channel, videoconferencing, webcasting, screencasting
• Development, support, and maintenance of the Sakai collaboration system
• Support for departments to develop a shared academic software collection
• Support for researchers who need advanced technologies to conduct their research

For more information, contact OIRT

Federal Ruling Clarifies Fair Use Guidelines for E-Reserves

Posted by Art Bath on 2012 May 14 at 5:03 PM

The statute of fair use, which allows portions of copyrighted materials to be used in academic contexts, typically protects e-reserves, electronic copies of textbook segments and other materials held by a university library. Though recently, a group of publishers have filed a federal suit against Georgia State University, in which they claim that 99 items from the university’s electronic reserves were an abuse of fair use and infringed upon the publishers’ copyrights.

Ultimately, the judge ruled heavily in favor of fair use, and, in her ruling, set forth four factors for determining whether an electronic reserve item is protected under fair use or not:

• “The purpose and character of your use”—whether the document is to be used for educational purposes or otherwise
• “The nature of the copyrighted work”—whether the work is primarily informational, technical, or artistic
• “The amount of sustainability of the portion taken”—whether the length of the copied portion exceeds 10% of the work
• “The effect of the use upon the potential market”—whether the copying of the work will substantially impact the revenues of the copyright holder

Overall, of the 99 pieces of copyrighted material that the publishers claimed were in violation, 94 were ruled to be protected under fair use, while the other 5 were abuses.

Fair use has proven to be a particularly difficult legal concept to navigate, but rulings like these slowly clarify boundaries.

Read more about the ruling and the four factors on Ars Technica and the Legal Inforation Institute.