Pharmacy Teaching Certificate Program

Images used in a lecture must be attributed to the owner. If you use your own images, please attribute them to yourself. If your whole presentation is created from images you made, you can use a blanket statement, e.g. "All images used in this lecture were created by 'Jon Smith, Pharm.D.'"

Many faculty use others' images. For instruction for citing these images, see the library's guide to citing images.

All course lectures will be posted on the course management system. Permissible images must meet certain criteria (either be public domain images, licensed resource images, creative commons licensed images, or images that the copyright holder has made freely available) and attribution must be included.  Some best practices for this include:

• Knowing the sources of the images as well as the allowable uses of the images
• Attributing the source with the library's recommended citation
• Placing a note in the slides notes specifying why the image is permissible to use, such as it falls in the public domain, is a licensed resource, is a creative commons image, permission has been granted, etc.

What Images Don't Require Permission? 

Public Domain Images

Public domain encompasses material for which no one owns or controls.  Public domain is based on the year of publication, the type of material, who published the work, and other criteria.  Some works in the public domain include works published before 1923 and works produced by the federal government.  However, in all instances of public domain works it is essential to confirm that the image and not just the text is in the public domain. 

To determine if a work is in the public domain, see the slider tool.

For more information on public domain see Stanford’s Copyright Overview 

Licensed Resources with Images

Some of the resources NEOMED owns have available images for educational purposes, such as AccessMedicine, AccessPharmacy, PharmacyLibrary, & SMARTImages.  Material in OhioLink’s Electronic Journal Center and Electronic Book Center also allow educational use of images and materials. 

Creative Commons Licensed Images         

Creative Commons Licenses allow copyright holders to make their work available to the public with certain limitations.  There are six creative commons licenses (Attribution, Attribution Share Alike, Attribution No Derivatives, Attribution Non-Commercial, Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike, and Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives), but all of them allow for the use of materials in an educational context as long as proper citation is included. For help see Citing Creative Commons Licenses. 

The Copyright Holder has made Images Available

Occasionally, copyright holders may specify that the images or materials be freely available.  This will often appear with the copyright information at the bottom of the text, and as long as the text specifies that the intended use is allowed, the image may be used. (Some websites also specify that certain uses are allowed in their terms of use. For example images may be available to use for educational purposes, and the site may provide a required citation or information that is necessary to include in the citation.)

What Images Do Require Permission?

Images from a website, book, or journal that NEOMED does not have access to or any copyrighted materials that do not fall into the above categories require permission.

Keep in mind:

• Obtaining permission can take up to 6 to 8 weeks!
• Permissions are generally granted for a limited amount of time; so, remember to specify the length of time you wish to obtain permission for the images in the request.  However, some publishers only grant permission as a onetime use.  

See Permissions for more information.

1.  I teach the same course every year.  May I distribute handouts containing copies of journal articles and other published materials every year if I ask the students to return them at the end of the course?

Fair Use guidelines state the following prohibitions regarding the use of copied materials: 

• Copying shall not be repeated with respect to the same item by the same teacher from term to term [i.e., repetitive use in the same course, regardless of the frequency of the course].
• Copying shall not substitute for the purchase of books, publishers' reprints or journals.

If the same materials are to be used each term, the instructor should request permission to use the materials from the owners of the materials each term.  Some publishers may grant permission for multiple uses over multiple terms, but most publishers grant permissions for only single terms.  Since the instructor knows the material will be used in future classes, there should be ample time for permission to be requested prior to the beginning of each course offering.

2.  I would like to use some images that I found on the web.  Can I use them without worrying about copyright?

• No, you must follow the same rules as you would for using information from a book, movie, journal, or any other resource. Check the websites "Terms of Use" to find out if you are able to reuse, or ask permission to use, the image from their web site.

3.  I have a file of images I've collected over the years. I use these as my teaching file. I can use all these images in lectures without worrying about copyright, correct?

• No, unless you created the images yourself, you still must worry about copyright! Images collected from articles and textbooks are still copyrighted by the publisher or author and may not be duplicated without permission. Additionally, all images must be cited - attribute your images as well!

4.  If I obtain permission from a publisher to reproduce a chapter, article, or image, is it acceptable to charge the students for this material?

• No charge shall be made to the student beyond the actual cost charged by the owner for permitting use of the material and the cost of photocopying.