FAQs Browse

Yes. However, when submitting your thesis, you will be required to grant a partial copyright license allowing the University Library to post your thesis in Summit, the University’s digital research repository, and allowing Library and Archives Canada to make your thesis available on the Internet and in searchable databases. These license clearly stipulates that you own the copyright to your thesis, but that you have allowed "non-exclusive" use of your thesis by the University Library and by Library and Archives Canada.

Currently, honours theses are not available in the library and undergraduate students do not typically submit their theses to the library. 

Honours theses may be deposited in Summit, SFU's research repository. Contact your undergraduate honours supervisor about the suitability of putting your honours thesis in Summit. If your supervisor agrees that your honours thesis belongs in Summit, please forward it to summit@sfu.ca along with your name and the name of your supervisor.

Please feel free to contact summit@sfu.ca for more information about submitting your work.

As a rule, SFU Library does not purchase all the textbooks used for courses taught at SFU. However, use the catalogue to look for your book - your text may be on reserve or in the general collection.

Textbooks are available for sale at the SFU Bookstore.

The best source for finding university calendars is now the internet. University calendars are usually linked from the home page of the university which can ordinarily be easily found through a search using any one of the regular search engines, e.g. Google.

At the Burnaby campus, a large collection of calendars in paper format is available in the SFU Registrar's Office, in the Maggie Benston Centre, entered between the Bookstore and the Pub. The Registrar's Office is on the Mall level, at the extreme south-east corner of the floor. This collection is accessible during all hours the Registrar's Office is open.

The Belzberg Library (Harbour Centre Campus) keeps some print calendars from BC Universities and Lower Mainland Colleges and Institutes, although most have now been replaced by online catalogues. The print catalogues are in the LB call number range in the Belzberg Reference collection.

The Surrey Library does not have calenders from other universities.

No. Citing the source of a work you use is good academic practice and helps you avoid plagiarism, but citation alone does not mean you are permitted to copy the work.

In order to legally copy a copyright-protected work for use in teaching materials, assignments, or theses/dissertations, your use must be permitted by one of the following:

• explicit permission from the copyright owner;
• use of an "insubstantial" amount, e.g., a typical short quote of a few sentences;
• a users' rights exception in the Copyright Act, such as fair dealing;
• the terms of a license, like those the SFU Library has for ejournals and ebooks [note: these licenses typically don't permit use in a thesis/dissertation]; or
• the terms of an open license, such as a Creative Commons license, applied to the work by its copyright owner.

Yes.

Three libraries form the SFU Library:

1. The WAC Bennett Library or Bennett, which is located on the Burnaby Mountain Campus and is the main SFU Library.

2. The Belzberg Library or Belzberg, located in downtown Vancouver.

3. The Fraser Library or Fraser, located in Surrey.

The Library catalogue lists books, journals, etc. for all three libraries. You can transfer items between libraries by using the Request button in the Library's Catalogue.

The word "WEB" listed as a library in the Library Catalogue means that the item listed is available on the Web.

The phrase "Curriculum collection" listed as a library in the Library Catalogue means that the item can be found in the Curriculum Collection in the Bennett Library.

The SFU Library does not provide research services for a fee, however, patrons can contact InfoAction, Vancouver Public Library's fee-based research service.

SFU Surrey (Fraser) Library does not offer English as an Additional Language classes, however, other resources are available:

Students can attend a workshop, book a conversation consultation, and get help with academic writing in English at the Student Learning Commons.

Community members can attend a drop-in English conversation circle at Surrey Public Libraries, register for the English Conversation Program with the City of Surrey, or find classes through the New to BC website.

Yes. The Library research skills tutorial is a Canvas module which introduces concepts like refining topics, finding background information including reference sources, and where to find scholarly articles.

To import this tutorial into your Canvas course, go to Canvas Commons to search for the desired tutorial by title and then follow these step-by-step instructions to import the content. If you need further assistance, contact IT Services.

The Library does not normally carry past exams.  For assistance in finding previous or practice exams at SFU, see Exam Preparation: Previous and Practice Exams.