Legal Information Center
Quick Links...
Circulation policy
Computer assistance
Course
reserves/old exams
Passwords
Printing/photocopying
Reference help
Reserve collection
Student employment
Study rooms
Guide
for non-law students
Law Student Services
Law and other graduate students may check out circulating material from the Legal Information Center for eight weeks. Loan periods vary by material type and individual library. The Main Library has compiled a more detailed list of borrowing privileges. Renew items, or just keep on eye on what you have checked out, via the online catalog; or bring your material to any of the Circulation Desks of the University of Florida Libraries. Items requested by another patron may not be renewed. You may request a HOLD be placed on a checked out item, or ask that an item not owned by the UF Libraries be borrowed from another library via Interlibrary Loan (ILL). For more detailed information regarding the Circulation Department click here.
Technology Services is the computing, networking, and web maintenance department of the Levin College of Law. Computing Services can be contacted by phone at 352.273.0750 or by e-mail to help@law.ufl.edu. PLEASE NOTE: The UF College of Law does not provide support for personally-owned computers. Ask at the Reference Desk if you need help with the use of online databases. The Information Technology website for the University of Florida has information to help you with your personal computing issues, such as troubleshooting your wireless connection. The CIRCA site gives information dealing with laptop printing.
If you would like to see a more detailed list of who does what in the law library and how to contact them, click here.
If you need a Westlaw or Lexis password, please contact a student representative. Call Lexis or Westlaw toll free at 1-800-Westlaw or 1-800-45-Lexis if you have forgotten your password.
For passwords related to databases that are restricted to the UF law school community only, please contact Elizabeth Outler at outler@law.ufl.edu.
Gatorlink passwords are changed at http://www.gatorlink.ufl.edu or call them at 392-help.
Printing
The UF community
can print from the general-use computers located in
the library to high-speed printers provided by CIRCA,
which is a pay per copy service. You may also configure
your laptop
to print. The bill goes on to your account
at the Student Financial Center in Criser Hall.
Lexis and Westlaw provide free printing of their material (does not apply to TWEN or Blackboard) to the law school community via their networked printers. Please only print what you need.
Photocopying
Photocopiers are provided. A debit card must be
purchased for $1.00 (dollar bill- no change) at the
card dispenser with the cost of the card deducted
(i.e. - the card purchased will be less than $1.00).
More money may be added to the card at the card dispenser.
The Reference Desk, located on the first floor of the Legal Information Center, is staffed by a team of professional librarians and reference assistants. Our job is to help you use the Legal Information Center. We are available many, but not all, hours the Legal Information Center is open. Our phone number is 352.273.0700.
How can we help you?
- We can tell you where things are in the Legal Information Center.
- We can show you how to use library databases such as the library catalog and periodical indexes.
- We can help you figure out legal citations.
- We can show you how to use sources in the Legal Information Center.
- We can suggest sources for you to use.
- We can refer you to other libraries or institutions when our library does not have what you need.
Telephone Reference
We provide several services
by phone. We can search our catalog to see whether
the Legal Information Center has particular books
or journals you want. We can locate phone numbers,
addresses, and other directory information for bar
associations, federal and state government agencies,
courts, publishers, and other law-related organizations.
We can take your order for photocopies of specific
legal documents for delivery through the Legal Information
Center's Interlibrary
Loan service.
What we will do for you over the phone is limited by our policy on legal research and legal advice and by staff availability. For many research projects, you will need to come in to the Legal Information Center and conduct your own research.
For ethical and practical reasons:
- We cannot do legal research for you.
- We cannot interpret the law for you or give you legal advice.
- We cannot read statutes, cases, court rules, or definitions over the phone.
- If the library owns something, we can tell you whether it is checked out, but we do not have the staff to go to the shelf to confirm that it is available.
- We are not able to return long distance telephone calls.
Our Policy on Legal Research and Legal Advice
While we can help you use
the Legal Information Center, we cannot do legal research
for you. If you need to find out what the law is,
we encourage you to come into the Legal Information
Center and look it up. When you come in, we will show
you where the sets are and how to use the indexes,
but you are responsible for your own research. If
you find a law or case that is not clear to you, we
will not interpret it for you; instead we will suggest
law dictionaries or other sources that might help
you interpret it. Why do we have this policy? There
are several good reasons.
- Advising people what the law is and how it applies to their situation may be practicing law--it is what lawyers do. We are librarians; our job is to help people use the library, not to research and interpret the law for them. If you need someone who will research and interpret the law for you, you should consider talking to an attorney. We have a list of free and low-cost legal services and referral services.
- For similar reasons stated above, it is our policy not to read legal materials over the telephone. If you cannot come to the Legal Information Center, you might want to use our fee-based Interlibrary Loan Service, see Photocopy/Fax Service below.
- Legal research can often be complicated, even for a simple question. For example, you might ask, "What is the statute of limitations for a car accident in State X?" Depending on the state, it might make a difference whether the accident resulted in an injury or a fatality. It might also make a difference if the person who wants to sue was a minor at the time of the accident or was unable to start a lawsuit right away.
- And there might be other factors to consider. It makes sense for you to do your own research and see what factors might apply to your situation. You can then choose which cross-references to follow. Doing legal research for all callers would soon overwhelm our staff. It is fair to everyone to say: "Please come into the Legal Information Center; when you come in, we will help you find and use the sources you need to do your own research."
The Reserve Collection is located behind the Circulation Desk, however feel free to browse through its holdings. The collections consists of:
- Course reserves
- Current periodical (journals) volumes
- Current Federal Register volumes
- Practice-oriented Florida materials
- Restatements of the law
- Treatises (select ones)
- Old exams
Notebooks on the Circulation Desk counter act as a guide to materials in the collection. Library-owned material has a record in the library's online catalog, which indicates that the item is on reserve and not in the circulating collection. Many old exams are available online in the reserve module of the library catalog.
Law student organizations may have items placed on reserve by contacting Paula Watkins at watkins@law.ufl.edu.
The Legal Information Center employs a number of students in several departments. The Circulation Desk has forms you may fill out when inquiring about employment.
Checking out a Study Room
There are 12 study rooms available on the second floor of the library. Law students may checkout available rooms for a two-hour period. Each study room needs at least two ID’s to be checked out and room 247 (the larger 6 person room) needs at least four ID’s. All law students must be present with their ID’s. This is to ensure that the rooms are being used fairly for group study sessions only. A key will be checked out to a representative for the group, and this person will be responsible for any fines that will accrue if the room becomes overdue. Students may renew a room after the initial two-hour period ONLY if there is nobody waiting.
Reserving a Study Room
Students may reserve rooms in advance. However, they may only reserve one 2-hour slot for the current day and/or one 2-hour slot for the next day. This policy is in place so that no one has the opportunity to monopolize any one room or time slot. If all the rooms are full then a group may reserve a slot for the next available room. If however, a room becomes available before a groups’ reservation time then it is loaned on a first come first serve basis. There is no waiting list.
Lactation/Religious Observance Room
Room 204 is a special needs room and is reserved for nursing mothers and religious prayer only. Those students who wish to use Room 204 need to have their Gator-1 card and will be given a 30-minute time slot to use the room.
Rules
- No food or drink
- Excessive noise may result in a request to leave.
- Violations of any portion of this policy may result in denial of future room use.
GatorLink
Maps
Off-campus connecting
Wireless connecting
Student Borrowing Privileges