Borrowing and circulation
Who can borrow?
Students, faculty, staff and visitors may borrow from the Library using their ID/Library card.
How do I borrow?
To find a book, first search the Library Catalogue. This will give you details of how many copies of the item there are, how many are available and the shelf mark – which is the code that tells you where the item is in the library. To borrow a book or other item, take it to the circulation desk. A valid library card is required to check out material. Items may be returned either to the circulation desk or in the red "book drop box" outside the library. All items borrowed from the Library remain the responsibility of the customer until returned. Lost books should be reported to the circulation desk immediately.
What can I borrow?
Most books and DVDs can be taken out on loan, with the exception of journals and theses which are for use in the Library only. Reference material may not be taken into the Reading Room except with the approval of a librarian.
How do I renew items I have checked out?
Users with an active Hertie School ID card may renew library materials unless a hold/recall request has been placed on the material by another library user.
Items may be renewed in any of the following ways:
- By logging into your library account if you do not have any recalled or overdue library materials (Number: Barcode number on the back of your Hertie School Card; Password: first 3 letters of your last name),
- Circulation Desk with the material(s) and a valid Hertie School ID card,
- By phone at (030) 25 92 19 - 409,
- By e-mail at library[at]hertie-school[dot]org.
What happens if I return items late?
We have a fines system in place to deter from late renewals or returns, trying to keep access to resources as flexible for everyone as possible.
After 35 days of overdue the book will be replaced at your expense.
Please note these fines are subject to change at the discretion of the Manager of Library and Information Services without notice.
Paying Library Charges
Library late fines and replacement charges help keep library materials circulating and available to all members of the Hertie School community.
You can pay library charges (cash) in person when you visit the library, or you can pay by bank transfer (see bank account details).
Reasons generally not considered valid for waiving or reducing library charges include (but are not limited to):
- Lack of knowledge of library policy
- Disagreement with library fine/fee structure
- Inability to pay library fees or charges
- Material loaned to a third party
- Material not reasonably protected from theft
- Non-receipt of an overdue notice**
- Returning items to library other than Hertie library
- Returning reserves items to bookdrop instead of to the Circulation Desk
- Being out of town
- Forgetting the due date
- Term breaks, leaves, vacations, exams
Interlibrary loan (ILL) and document delivery services
The Interlibrary Loans Service (ILL) obtains books and articles that are not held in Hertie School Library's collection.
Placing ILL Requests
Before making a request please ensure that material is neither held by Hertie School library (check Hertie School Discovery Search), nor available electronically, or available for consultation at any other Berlin library to which Hertie School staff and students have access. Please check the Berlin libraries catalogue.
The ILL services are for students, faculty and staff of the Hertie School and for purposes related to studying, research and teaching only.
Since the Hertie School Library may lose borrowing privileges at other libraries due to late or not returned ILL books, the library user will be blocked from the ILL service upon the third overdue notice.
Delivery of Material
The Hertie School Library uses the GBV (Common Library Network) and Subito (the biggest German document delivery service) in order to support your research.
Most loans requested on interlibrary loan will arrive in about 3-4 workdays but in some cases may take longer. If you require an item urgently, please contact the library staff.
When the item arrives, you will be notified through email and you can pick it up at the information desk.
Postal loan service
This service is available to participants of the EMPA programme.
- You can request up to 4 books at a time which will be sent from the library.
- There is no charge for this service.
- Short Loan and Reference items cannot be borrowed by post.
- You are expected to pay for the book(s) to be returned to us by Recorded Delivery for security purposes.
- Alternatively individual chapters (or 5%) of texts can be photocopied for you.
How to submit a request
Check whether a book is in stock by consulting the online catalogue.
Fill in the Postal Order Form or send your request to library[at]hertie-school[dot]org. Your request must specify Author and Titel of the book(s). Please also include your full postal address.
Computing and photocopying
Working environment and network
The Hertie School provides wireless LAN in the whole building but you can also access the internet via the LAN ports at the study room tables (short cables, usually grey, blue or red). Your computer will detect 3 wireless networks: “HS-Guest”, “HS-Staff” and “HS-Student”. Please always use HS-Student since this is the only network that allows for printing and scanning.
You can log in to these computers with your username, password and the domain HERTIE. Please do not save your personal data on these workstations. We will automatically delete all data on these workstations regularly for maintenance reasons. Let us know if something does not work so we can fix things quick.
Printing / Copying / Scanning
If you want to scan, print or copy you can use any of the printing machines you can find near the study rooms on the second floor and third floor, and near the library. To access these functions you have to use your student ID.
Any printing job will be sent to our printer server and will remain there for six hours. This is how long you can wait before you actually printing out your print job.
How to print:
Please find all information on https://moodle.hertie-school.org/ -> General -> IT Services -> Printing & Copying
Consider that a printing job is first sent to the server via a wireless connection and then downloaded again from the server to the copy machine. In busy times that can take a few minutes. If you start sending your documents to the printer again when you don't see them instantly, it will just slow down further. It is helpful to
- give some time for a document to arrive,
- rather use times with quieter traffic for printing,
- use LAN cables in the study rooms instead of the Wireless LAN.
Every scan will be available (and visible for everybody in the network!) on \\saturn\ScanIn. You can also scan to your USB-Stick instead.
Note that all copy machines are leased and we have to call the company when they are out of order. Please inform IT in this case.
Copyright law
Photocopying is bound by current copyright legislation. For more information about copyright click here.
Research management software
Reference management software allows you to create a personal database or library of references and generate automatic bibliographies in a variety of referencing styles.
The Hertie School provides access to Citavi for current Hertie School staff members, researchers and students.
Citavi combines reference management and knowledge organisation. With Citavi you can search resources, create tasks, analyse texts, save quotations and ideas and create outlines for drafts. Citavi Web is available for Mac, Windows and Linux.
Need help? Visit Citavi's Support Center or contact your Hertie School librarians.
Alternative reference management programs
Zotero is a free, open-source reference management program that creates bibliographies or references for any text files such as Google Doc, LibreOffice or Word. Zotero lets you co-write a paper with a colleague, or build a collaborative bibliography. It runs both a web service and an offline service on your personal device.
Mendeley is a free desktop and web program for managing and sharing research papers, discovering research data and collaborating online. It is available for Mac, Windows or Linux. Premium plans to upgrade storage space can be purchased.
Publishing in the Hertie School Research Repository (OPUS)
All Hertie School faculty, students and staff are invited to publish their research findings and scholarly work on the Hertie School Research Repository (OPUS). This service is free of charges and ensures your work to be available for a global audience. You can publish PhD dissertations and other scientific works like journal articles, proceedings, working papers etc.
Advantages of electronic publications
- Fast dissemination of your work and easy access for scholars around the world
- Long-term archival services and a stable and a permanent online address
What would you like to publish?
Digital doctoral theses
How to publish your dissertation with the HSRR (Hertie School Research Repository)
All doctoral students at the Hertie School can submit their doctoral thesis online. The LIS team will provide you with assistance in all questions relating to the formalities of the process.
The publication agreement with the Hertie School Library grants to the Hertie School the non-exclusive rights to archive your dissertation on the Institutional Repository; you are free to publish your dissertation — either an identical version or a different version — elsewhere, providing no rights assigned in the publication agreement are infringed. The copyright of your doctoral thesis remains with you. You agree to a copy of your dissertation being archived in the Deposit copies repository of the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek or in electronic repositories.
Submission Procedure: Step by step guide
You should already have a personal account for the HSRR. If not, please contact us.
Where do I hand in the printed copies?
When you publish you dissertation online, five additional print copies (according to § 16,3 Doctoral degree regulations) have to be submitted to the Library either in person (room 1.31) or via post to:
Hertie School – Library
Friedrichstraße 180
10117 Berlin
If you send them via post please attach the signed form of the publication agreement.
Contact
If any questions or problems arise, please contact the LIS team.
Regulations
For further information please refer to the publication provisions in English or German.
Other scholarly work
FAQs for faculty and researchers
Will the HSRR publications be directly synchronized with - and placed on - the faculty members Hertie website?
Yes. In the future, all entries in HSRR will be visible like a publication list on the faculty websites. In Addition, we’re working on the possibility to export the publications list to PDF. Like that, you’ll have to enter them only once into HSRR and can view the entries in different formats.
Will all final publications be postable or only working papers? What are the copyright limitations?
That depends on the usage rights the author agreed upon with the publisher. A lot of publishers agree to you archiving your publications in a working paper format on a repository like HSRR. The Sherpa/Romeo-List provides a good first overview which publisher is setting which copyright limitations. It depends what kind of contract an author/editor signs with a publisher for each publication.
Is OPUS accessible to Google Scholar web crawlers?
Yes, OPUS is fully indexed by Googles Scholar. Also other international repositories can get publications automatically via a web crawler (e.g. SSOAR, OpenAIRE …).
