Ownership of intellectual property created by full-time and part-time faculty, staff, and graduate students engaged in faculty-directed research, as well as individuals compensated by grant funds made available to the University by or through the Research Foundation is covered by the CUNY Intellectual Property Policy . The general rule is that Copyrightable Works are owned by their creator. This means that faculty members typically own the copyright in their scholarly and pedagogical works.
Most students are not covered by the CUNY Intellectual Property Policy. Their ownership rights are governed by the Copyright Act, which grants copyright ownership to the author of a work (i.e., the student), unless it is a work-for-hire. Consequently, classroom assignments, student papers and the like are owned by the student. More >>