UMass Lowell Library Guide for Faculty

Sometimes also called "course reserves", "course readings", or "course materials", these are required or supplemental material assigned by instructors for their courses. They may be:

• Physical materials available at the Circulation Desk at Lydon or O'Leary Library
• Online materials available with UML email and password

What does NOLO and OER mean, and what do they have to do with my classes?

• NOLO and OER are both types of course materials that make your classes less expensive for your students
• NOLO: No or Low-Cost. These are readings that are either NO or LOW cost to your students. They may be NOLO because:
  • The library and university has paid (perhaps a lot) for campus access, so items are not free, but free to students
  • Items can be provided (through discounts or just being low-cost) to students for a relatively low amount, such as $50
• OER: Open Educational Resource. This is a book or list of readings that have been released totally free, for everyone, on the open web.

Library staff can help find NOLO or OER alternatives to expensive textbooks using resources such as:

• ​Materials already in the Libraries’ print and digital collections (paid for by the university and library, free to your students)
• New multi-user ebooks for purchase (where library funding allows)
• Searches for ​OERs on the web

The UMass Lowell Library offers our students, staff, and faculty thousands of full text ebooks.

• Many are available for unlimited use by the campus community.
• Some are limited to 3 or 1 simultaneous users.
• To ensure maximum access, encourage your students to close the ebook as soon as they are done reading or downloading

Follow these steps to find ebooks:

1. Using the Catalog, enter the title, keywords or subject for the book you are looking for.

2. Filter the results in the left hand column of the results page. 

• Under Held by Library click "UMass Lowell Libraries".
• Under Format click "eBook"

3. Click the blue "View Ebook" button. This will take you the specific platform where the title may be found.

• While useful for temporary access, please note that the Internet Archive is not owned by the library and not guaranteed permanent access for a classroom textbook.
• There will generally be information about the number of simultaneous users near the title or "about this book" section of the page.