Policies & Guidelines

Our Accessibility Services page has information on physical and digital accessibility in the library, with links to campus resources.

Our Advertising Policy lists Library and University related advertising guidelines.

Our Alumni & Community Users policy lists the wide range of library and computing services that we offer to alumni and members of the community.

The Library's Code of Conduct explains the appropriate use of our facilities and collections.

Our Principles

The SDSU Library seeks to build a collection through strategic, sustainable, and data driven practices to maximize our support of the university’s teaching, learning, and research. We are committed to providing support for the university’s mission and strategic goals through innovative collection development practices and routinized assessment. The following principles will guide collections’ decisions:
  • Student Success – The SDSU Library is funded through state appropriations and a student fee. The library’s collection will be built with a focus on resources that support student success in all disciplines and at all levels. We will use collection assessments, syllabi, and feedback from university stakeholders to ensure the library’s collection’ is built to best serve students in their current educational journey.
  • Increased Access – The Library has adopted a stance of access over ownership philosophy when approaching strategic collection decisions. This “just-in-time” model of acquiring content maximizes our ability to support a broad range of disciplines and to nimbly adjust purchasing to support new endeavors. This includes maintaining an electronic format preferred purchasing practice for most resources to maximize access to our students, faculty, and staff.
  • Data Informed Decisions – The SDSU Library will use data to inform its collections decisions. This data will be broad in scope including usage, overlap analysis, and current disciplinary requirements. It will also include analysis of resources available from other CSU and local libraries. Qualitative rubrics will be utilized to better evaluate uniqueness, specific disciplinary justifications, interdisciplinary value, and ensure diverse perspectives.
  • Innovative Approaches – The Library will develop innovative approaches in creating opportunities to support faculty and student research. Through new selection programs and cost-sharing agreements with departments and colleges the library will seek to leverage discipline specific relationships to build a more robust and relevant collection of resources.
  • Collaboration – The SDSU Library will take full advantage of consortia, system, local, and university partnerships to better serve the university’s needs through shared print, inter-library loans, and economies of scale purchases. The collaborative nature of this principle allows the library to solidify our stance as a research and teaching university.
 
 
 
 

Our Computer Use Policy details how to access and use computers in the Library and at SDSU.

Our Diversity Statement shows the SDSU Library's commitment to supporting our diverse population of students, faculty, and staff.

Find out how to obtain permission to film or photograph within the Library.

Our Food & Drink Policy also includes a list of our food-friendly areas.

Our Freedom of Access & Privacy page explains where our policy is drawn from.

Find out more about making a gift to the library. 
 
Please note: The library is unable to accept unsolicited donations of physical materials at this time. 

The Library Faculty Policy File (revised through June 2025) is intended to supplement the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) and the San Diego State University Policy File (UPF).

All found items are turned into the Circulation/Course Reserves desk, down the stairs from the Dome entrance. Contact Circulation at 619-594-6793 or [email protected]

Our Room Reservations page explains how to request the use of a library room for meetings, events, talks etc.

Find out what kind of Study Spaces are available and how to use them.

The SDSU Library Sustainability Committee is committed to reducing the impact of the SDSU Library on the environment and embracing sustainability as a core value of librarianship. Read our Sustainability Policy.

Find out who can borrow materials from the Library.