Skip to Main Content

Dealing with Copyright in Education

Use links in Canvas

One of the easiest ways to include material in educational resources free of charge is to link to it. This is free of charge in all cases. For example, instead of uploading a PDF of an article to Canvas (which costs the VU money), you can also link to that article in the journal in which it was originally published. This usefull guide explains how to do this in Canvas.

Although it might seem like there is not much of a difference between uploading the PDF on Canvas and including a link to the article on Canvas, it makes a lot of difference for copyright. This difference lies in the fact that by uploading the PDF, in the eyes of the law you are actually republishing the work, whereas when linking, you are only referring to the location where the PDF was originally published, in a copyright-friendly manner. Embedding a YouTube video, for example, also counts as linking.

Embedding

One of the easiest ways to include images in educational resources free of charge is to link to them. This is called embedding, and is free of charge in all cases. Instead of posting an entire image on Canvas (which costs the VU money), you can also link to that image.

Below, you will find instructions on how to do this in Canvas:

  • If you found the image online, copy the image’s URL (preferably by using the Share icon )
  • Select Embed Image () in the menu bar and paste the URL in the space provided.

 

Below, you will find instructions on how to do this in a PowerPoint presentation in Windows:

  • If you found the image online, copy the image’s URL (preferably by using the Share icon )
  • In the PowerPoint menu, select: Insert > Images ()
  • Paste the image’s URL in the File name field.
  • Click on the arrow next to ‘Insert’.
  • Select the option Link to file.
  • The image that then appears is embedded and is reloaded from the internet every time you open the presentation.

Please note: When opening embedded material, a pop-up will appear asking you to confirm that this external material, which you are trying to access online, can be trusted. You should always confirm this when you are using or need to use this external content. We recommend explaining this in your lectures/classes.

Note:Microsoft PowerPoint for Macs does not offer this embedding option. You should then use free sources such as Pixabay and Flickr (integrated in Canvas) or use a link.

Using links in printed material

You might not have thought about it before, but you can also link to websites in your lectures and even in your paper readers. For this you can use shortened links or QR codes.