Publisher supplementary/support materials

Many publishers provide supplementary or teaching support materials for textbooks. These are generally intended to be used for courses and shared with students, including via learning management systems like Canvas. There is however no blanket licence or approach for these resources, so each should be considered on a case-by-case basis. Check to see if the material comes with a permission/usage statement that allows for some form or distribution/sharing/embedding in a learning management system.

To keep within usage permissions granted by publishers, please see the best practice points for some common resources below.

Slide decks

  • Wherever possible, keep support slides supplied by publishers separate from your own course material – i.e., in distinct slide decks. This will help to keep the copyright and usage permissions clearer.
  • Publisher-supplied slides will usually include a copyright statement - do not remove  or obscure this statement.
  • If you need to combine publisher slides with University course slides, ⁠please seek advice on how to best approach this for your situation.

Exercises, case studies, questions, and solutions

  • If questions, exercises, cases, etc., and their solutions are provided as instructor materials, it's generally be OK to include this content directly in Canvas modules where permission has been provided for use or reproduction. Ensure that you follow any directions provided for use (e.g., only providing selections and not supplying the whole document).
  • An attribution statement should be included with all text material added to Canvas to show the source and permission, e.g., "Solution taken from 'Solutions manual to accompany Financial reporting 4th edition', by Loftus et al. © John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd 2022. Reproduced here with permission."
  • Where questions are from a textbook or instructor material and express permission for use is not provided, it may still be possible to add the the questions where they are short and generic in nature (e.g., "What are the key elements of the sociological imagination?"). Longer, more detailed questions (such as those incorporating case studies) should only be reproduced in Canvas with permission of the publisher. Depending on the material involved, it may also be possible to add this content as textbook pages via our ⁠Course Readings system.

Flyers, PDF documents, etc.

  • Publishers may also include other materials/documents as supplementary materials with textbooks. Do not assume that these are 'safe' to share with students via Canvas unless an appropriate usage statement is provided.
  • If the materials are publicly accessible via the web, best practice would be to provide a link to these rather than including them as a file in Canvas.

Psychological measures and health tests

  • These are, more often than not, proprietary or commercial materials and should not be shared with students via Canvas unless explicit permission has been provided to do so. This may be included in the resource itself, or gained through contacting the publisher.

Need help with any of the above? Contact the Copyright Advisor