Policies: Home

Generally Applicable Study Room Policies

The purpose of the room reservation process is to enable law students to work towards their law school success. To achieve this goal, the following policies apply to all group study rooms except the active study room in the Law Library:

1. The study rooms are for law students, and law students only. Law students who need to accommodate their children, other dependents, or aids are the only exclusions from this rule. Any non-law student use should be reported to the library help desk. The intent of this rule is to make sure our spaces are used by our students.
2. Study rooms may be reserved using the law library reservation system. Reserved rooms have a two-person minimum. Reserved rooms being used by only one person may be asked to forfeit their reservation. The intent of this rule is to keep the rooms available for their best use, collaborative study.
3. Students may only make one study room reservation per day, although students are free to additionally utilize any room that has not been reserved. Reservations can be made for the same day or the next day only. The intent of this rule is to create as many opportunities to use the rooms as possible.
4. Rooms have a two-hour use maximum. You must leave the room after two hours, although it is perfectly fine to move to another room if there are other rooms available. The intent of this rule is to allow waiting students opportunities to use rooms and disfavor monopolization of rooms.
5. If you reserve a study room and you are subsequently unable to fulfill that reservation, please cancel your reservation as soon as possible. The intent of this rule is to give others an opportunity to reserve the space.
6. If a room is empty, any law student may use it until/unless a group with a reservation claims the space in person. Single student use of empty rooms is allowed. The intent of this rule is that the rooms be used as much as they are wanted, by as many people as they can accommodate.
7. Although you may certainly snack/drink while you study, the rooms should be used for study and collaboration, not eating. Please use the student lounge or other campus spaces to enjoy meals together. The intent of this rule is to keep the rooms available for their best use, study and collaboration.
8. Please tidy the room when you leave, push up your chair, take out your trash. Generally, be a good user of the space. The intent of this rule is to keep our space in great shape.

Please abide by these policies and be considerate of your colleagues. Anyone found not being a good user of the rooms may face consequences including loss of study room privileges.

Interview/Advocacy Room Policies & Information

1. There are fourteen interview/advocacy rooms behind card access from the second-floor atrium. These rooms also connect to the Career Development Office (CDO) on one side, and the Blakely Advocacy Institute (BAI) on the other side.
2. The priority of use for these rooms is with CDO and/or BAI. At times either of them may disable the card access to the rooms.
3. When the rooms are not in use with CDO or BAI, they are available for reservation as study rooms according to the policies above. All of points 1-8 above apply to your use of an interview/advocacy room as a study room. In point 1 above, non-law-student use should be reported to the CDO office.
4. CDO and BAI will indicate their priority use via reservations they place into the system. This will enable students to know what is available. At times, either department may reserve some or all of the rooms.

Room numbers are 3 or 4 characters, e.g., 101, 101B, L101.  The left-most character that is a number indicates the floor of the building for the room. The reservation system below groups the library study rooms by category (small, large, casual), and separates the Interview/Advocacy rooms into their own group.

Attorneys and members of the public are not able to check out Law Library materials.  If you have needs that can only be filled by the Law Library, please fill out this form. 

Borrowing Items

UH students may check out library materials with their Cougar Cards. Circulating materials can be checked out at the Law Library circulation desk, at one of the self-checkout stations on the 4th and 5th floors, or from the library vending machine on the 3rd floor.  

Loan Periods 

Circulating materials: Items may be borrowed for a two-week loan period and renewed for an additional two weeks if no hold is placed on the book. Renewals for these materials may be done from the online catalog, in person, or by phone (713.743.2300). Please note that many items in the library collection do not circulate and may not leave the library.

Course Reserves: The library maintains a collection of course textbooks and other items placed on reserve for Law Center courses by faculty members. These may be checked out for four hours and renewed up to four times if no hold is placed on the book.  

Overdue Items

The library will send reminders before items are due back and overdue notices after the loan periods have expired. If items are overdue, users may be charged a replacement and processing fee for the item, which must be paid through UH Student Accounting.  

Items From Other UH Libraries

Paging is a service that allows patrons to borrow books from the M.D. Anderson Library, UH main campus branch libraries, UH-Downtown, or UH-Clear Lake. Books can be requested through the Law Library catalog by clicking the "Request" link and can be delivered to the Law Library circulation desk. Patrons will receive an email when the item is ready for pickup.  

Returning Items

Items checked out from the library may be returned at the circulation desk or one of the library's self-checkout stations located on the 4th and 5th floors. 

Items checked out from the Law Library vending machine on the 3rd floor may be returned to the vending machine, the circulation desk, or the self-checkout stations on the 4th and 5th floors.  

Borrowing Items

UHLC faculty may check out library materials with their Cougar Cards at the Law Library circulation desk, at one of the self-checkout stations on the 4th and 5th floors, or from the library vending machine on the 3rd floor. Faculty may also request items by contacting their library liaison.  

Loan Periods

General Library Materials: UHLC faculty can check out most law library materials for one year. Items will be automatically renewed unless requested by another user.  

Textbooks: Course textbooks on reserve are meant for student use, and the library asks faculty to refrain from checking out these materials. If material is needed on an emergency basis, it may be checked out for 48 hours.

Overdue items

The library will send reminders before items are due back and overdue notices after the loan periods have expired.  

Items From Other UH Libraries

Paging is a service that allows patrons to borrow books from the M.D. Anderson Library, UH main campus branch libraries, UH-Downtown, or UH-Clear Lake. Books can be requested through the Law Library catalog by clicking the "Request" link and can be delivered to the Law Library circulation desk. Faculty can also request these items via their library liaison. When requested materials arrive, they will be routed to the faculty member.  

Returning Items

Items checked out from the library may be returned at the circulation desk or one of the library's self-checkout stations on the 4th and 5th floors. 

Items checked out from the Law Library vending machine on the 3rd floor may be returned to the vending machine, the circulation desk, or the self-checkout stations on the 4th and 5th floors.