How to donate collection materials

When we take in materials, we also provide long term access and research support services associated with the items. People want to use the materials they find in the collections. If you retain copyright, you will need to provide licensing management for the duration of the copyright term. We will then need to perform an additional service of referring all requests for use to you, which means we need to always have your current contact information on file. This is an additional level of administration that we do not have to undertake if we own and manage the copyright. We are also able to work with the creators of materials who may wish to retain their copyright, but are willing to permanently license the material for other people to use in specific conditions.

Materials with strict and/or complicated copyright terms may be rejected due to restrictions surrounding their re-use, which can impact the cost efficiency associated with their stewarding.

Please see the guidelines in our collection policy. In general, we do not accept materials outside our collecting scope; materials we already have; materials that are restricted; materials that raise privacy and ethical issues; or materials that cannot be shared or widely used due to copyright issues.

We will refer you to other repositories if we think the materials may be a better fit elsewhere. The library Gift-in-Kind policy also lists resources for donating or recycling materials.

Please see the guidance here:

Caring for materials requires professional staff and a secured and well-equipped environment. The university subsidizes these costs ̶ we do not charge donors to take on materials. If you are able, you are welcome to offset the stewardship costs by financially supporting us. Please do not let an inability to financially support our work stop you from reaching out about your materials!