The Digitisation Service obtains alternative format versions of content held by the Library on behalf of students or staff members with a Reasonable Adjustment Plan (RAP), or similar, in place.
If you don’t have an RAP, please contact Student Services in the first instance. Student Support Services usually inform us of a student's needs during the RAP process. We will then contact the student directly to discuss their needs and start working to obtain texts for them.
- All texts provided to staff and students are for their personal use only and cannot be given to any other persons.
- Course materials created and provided by Schools will continue to be managed at School level in conjunction with the local Reasonable Adjustment Co-ordinators.
- Assistive software is available IT Services cluster PC. This can be found on the Start Menu and is available to all students who have registered with the Disability, Mental health and Learning Support service. Specific details of the software available can be found on the Assistive Software webpage.
Requesting accessible texts or alternative format texts
- The Digitisation Service uses module information and resource lists to identify texts needed by students. We will confirm the module details with the student and then work through the ResourceLists prioritising those items marked as 'Essential' and 'Recommended'.
- The Service obtain texts by firstly checking existing e-resource provision. If there existing electronic copies available, the student will be directed to these as these resources are readily available and should need users' needs.
- Where an e-resource is not already available, or it is inaccessible, an alternative version will be sourced from the publisher or via RNIB Bookshare. This approach ensures our students will benefit from access to publisher digital files where they are available. They should be fully accessible and compatible with assistive technologies from the start, improving functionality.
- It can take up to eight weeks for replies to be received from publishers, so it is imperative that all items are listed within the resource lists, and changes are communicated to the Digitisation Service, as soon as possible.
- If publishers are unable to supply a suitable copy, we will scan the edition held by the Library using dedicated hardware and software to create an accessible version.
- When texts are available, they are added to a Canvas course that is created specifically for the student. The Canvas course will have pages for each module and the title of the texts and the authors will be clearly displayed.
Students
- If you have any queries, or haven't been contacted by the Digitisation Services please contact: digitisation@contacts.bham.ac.uk.
- If there are texts you need that haven't been provided, please let us know.
- If you have complex needs and are unable to access content in a particular way, please let us know and we will work with you to ensure you have everything you need in the format you need it.
- The supply of these texts is for your personal use in connection with your course of study only, and you are not permitted to give the files to any other person. You should delete copies of texts saved when you finish your studies at the University of Birmingham.
Teaching Staff/ Welfare Tutors
If you have concerns regarding a student and their access to content please contact us at digitisation@contacts.bham.ac.uk with details of the needs of the student concerned, and their specific needs.
When requesting texts, please include links to the resource list for the module(s) of study ensuring that the reading importances are set, as this will help identify the priority of these requests.
Where a resource list is not available, please provide the following for each and every item:
- Full title
- Author
- ISBN
- year
- edition
- publisher
- a link to FindIt@Bham
- Title and page range of the section required, if not the whole text.
Service Standards
- The Digitisation Service team aims to process or query requests within five working days of receipt. However, this will be impacted during busy periods, such as the start of term.
- All files provided by the Digitisation Service will be quality checked in line with the requirements outlined by the RAP. This includes a thorough text recognition function, ensuring text is readable by assistive technologies. Titles or section headings and similar navigational aids will be marked as such. Confirmation from the user will be sought.
- Please note we are not experts in the subjects within the texts requested, and therefore any descriptions or alt texts added to images should not be considered accurate representations of the content.
- Where items requested are in languages other than English, the accuracy of the text recognition element may be reduced. Further discipline-specific support may be required from tutors or support workers.
Contacts
Please contact digitisation@contacts.bham.ac.uk for assistance.