Faculty Guide to the Maloney Library: Other Library Services

The library is happy to help you locate and order items you wish to purchase with your faculty research funds. The library can verify ordering information, availability, order on your behalf, and/or process payment.

Please contact Deputy Director of the Law Library, Alissa Black-Dorward (212-636-7968, blackdorward@law.fordham.edu), with your request.

The Library employs its own Research Assistants.  Faculty may make use of the Library RAs when they have small (<20 hours) research projects that do not merit the hiring of their own RA. 

If you have a project you believe is suitable for the Library RAs please contact Reference Librarian, Gail McDonald (212-636-7005, gmcdonald5@fordham.edu).

Faculty input and expertise as to material we should have in our collection is always welcome.  Please feel welcome to suggest a new title for library purchase and it will be considered at the next acquisitions meeting. Please include your name on the suggestion.

Suggestions can also be sent directly to Alissa Black-Dorward, Deputy Director of the Law Library (212-636-7968 or blackdorward@law.fordham.edu), or to Todd Melnick, the Director of the Law Library (212-636-7677, tmelnick@law.fordham.edu).

When suggesting an item for acquisition, please indicate if you want to borrow the title and have it charged out to your library account, placed on course reserve, or added to the library's collection.

FLASH is Fordham Law School’s institutional repository. FLASH preserves and makes accessible on the web the documentary history and scholarship of the Fordham Law School community. If you would like to post any materials to FLASH including scholarly articles, photographs, reports, or data sets, please contact Deputy Director, Alissa Black-Dorward (212-636- 7968, blackdorward@law.fordham.edu).

Faculty members may request periodical articles or books from any Fordham University Library and from any electronic resource to which the Fordham University Library subscribes by contacting the Document Delivery Department at 212-636-6768 or via email at docdellib@law.fordham.edu.

In addition, requests for materials in the Fordham University Law School Catalog, can also be made by clicking the “Faculty Request” button when viewing the record. 

Requested material will be brought to faculty offices by the library’s faculty delivery service which delivers and retrieves books from faculty offices each weekday afternoon. If the requested material is currently available in the law library, it will be delivered by the next business day. If it is checked out by another patron, the Document Delivery Department will either recall it from that patron or request another copy via Interlibrary Loan (ILL). You will be notified as to the status of your request.

Requests for copies of articles or cases owned by the Law Library will be copied and forwarded to your office. Generally, these materials will be delivered the next business day. Additional time may be required for large requests.

Requests for photocopies for articles and books available at the Quinn Library at Lincoln Center will be copied or checked out and forwarded to your office. Generally, these materials will be delivered the next business day. 

The Interlibrary Loan (ILL) department is able to obtain material not held at the Law School Library from major research libraries worldwide.

Requests for material from outside institutions, including Fordham University's Quinn, Walsh, and Westchester campus libraries, can be made online through our web-based ILL system, Law ILLiad. A link to Law ILLiad can be found on the library home page under Library Services.

All users affiliated with the Law School should use Law ILLiad. Law ILLiad is separate from the ILLiad service operated by Fordham University Libraries. Fordham Law School faculty members should NOT use Fordham University’s ILLiad service.

Faculty Research Assistants (RAs) are granted greater library privileges than other students upon registration as an RA with the library. To register a faculty signature is required on the RA form. Alternatively, an e-mail providing the research assistant’s name, the duration of the assistantship, and whether you would like the research assistant to have borrowing privileges under your name can be sent to Circulation Desk (212-636-7820 or circulation@law.fordham.edu).

Registered Research Assistant Privileges:

• Additional Printing Allowances: Student printing in the law school is administered by the Information Systems and Planning Department (212-636-6786). Research Assistants should visit the IT Help Desk in the basement of the law school in order to have value added to their printing allowance to accommodate any RA printing needs
• Photocopy Funds: See the IT Law Help Desk (Lower Level 125) to receive extra funding for photocopying faculty related materials.
• Charge-out to faculty account: At the discretion of the faculty member, his or her RA may charge out materials in the faculty member's name for the loan periods granted to law faculty.
• Access to the Library's RA Legal Research Bootcamp: Research Assistants are also encouraged to improve their research skills by participating in the RA Legal Research Bootcamp, offered by the library at the end of May every year.  

Fordham Law Library supports empirical legal research by the faculty. This program is currently focused on the following areas:

1. Providing access to and support for faculty use of statistical software packages and datasets 

2. Providing faculty with information about resources that may exist at Fordham University generally to assist with empirical research 

3. Developing a collection of monographs, journals and databases that will assist faculty with their empirical research needs 

Please contact our Deputy Director/Empirical Research Specialist, Alissa Black-Dorward (212-636-7968, blackdorward@law.fordham.edu), for any inquiries related to empirical research.

For more information on executing empirical legal research projects, please look at the Maloney Library's Research Guide on Empirical Research here.

The library maintains full academic subscriptions to LexisNexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg Law and Fordham Law School Faculty have complete access to these databases.

Individual Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg Law passwords can be obtained from the Head of Circulation and Access, Mel Gooch (212-636-6901, mgooch@law.fordham.edu). 

If you need training or any other assistance with BloombergLaw, Lexis, or Westlaw, please contact our dedicated vendor representatives. You also have 24/7 access to research help on these systems at: LexisNexis: 1-800-455-3947 (1-800-45LEXIS); Westlaw: 1-800-937-8529 (1-800-WESTLAW); Bloomberg Law: 1-888-560-2529 (1-888-560-BLAW) 

Columbia and NYU

Under consortia agreements with Columbia Law School and NYU Law School Library, all members of the Fordham Law School faculty and student body have automatic access with their Fordham Law School ID to the NYU Law Library and the Columbia Law Library.

Other NYC Law Libraries

Single day access is available to other NYC area law libraries through the "Green Letter" system. These letters are available at the Fordham Law Library reference desk. Extended use is available by prior arrangement. Please contact Alissa Black-Dorward, Deputy Director of the Law Library (212-636-7968, blackdorward@law.fordham.edu), and special arrangements will be made for you to access the law library.

Other NYC Non-Law Libraries

Fordham Law Library is a member of METRO, the Metropolitan New York Library Counsel. The Reference Desk can provide you with a yellow METRO card for access to any other member library. A list of METRO member libraries can be found at the website of METRO (go to http://www.metro.org/ then click on Member Directory at the bottom of the page).

Yellow METRO cards are good for one day use and are available from the reference desk. We can attempt to make arrangements for longer access periods with advance notice.

Contact Alissa Black-Dorward, Deputy Director of the Law Library (212-636-7968, blackdorward@law.fordham.edu), for extended access arrangements.