If you are a faculty member, student, or staff at a CUNY college, that campus library is your home library and you should ask a reference librarian there how to activate your library privileges. Note that faculty members are often entitled to different services and longer borrowing periods than students, so if you are both a faculty member and student at two different or the same CUNY college, you should ask for an account with your faculty ID at the applicable campus library. With library privileges at any CUNY library, you have access to all that library's electronic resources as well as the electronic resources from the Central Office and you can walk into any CUNY campus library and borrow books there.*
If you are a CUNY Central Office employee with no college affiliation, your home library is CUNY Central. You are entitled to access to all of the electronic resources on our resource page and, with your CUNY ID card, you can walk into any CUNY campus library. To access any of the electronic resources from home or a non-CUNY location, you will need your CUNY Login credentials. To borrow books at any campus library*, you will need to know your EMPLID.
*Please note that the CUNY School of Law does not allow other CUNY faculty, staff, or students to borrow books.
If you are a CUNY Central Office employee (and/or a student, staff, or faculty member at any one of the CUNY campuses), you already have a library account you may use to borrow physical material. To borrow materials in person, you will need to bring your CUNY ID card to the service desk of the lending library.
From any CUNY location, you can go to the list of Library Electronic Resources and click on any resource link for access. If you are home or in some other non-CUNY location, you will use your CUNY Login credentials to sign in.
If you are accessing one of CUNY Central's Library Electronic Resources from a CUNY location, you should not be prompted for a username or password.
If you are at home or another non-CUNY location, you will be prompted for your CUNY Login credentials, not a user ID and password. If you are prompted for a user ID and password, you have most likely tried to access the resource outside of the CUNY e-resource page or OneSearch. Please use one of these library tools to access library resources to ensure you do not hit a paywall.
With your CUNY ID, you can walk into any* CUNY library and use their print and e-resources on site. (There are a few exceptions—some libraries have licenses to databases that only allow use for their own students; these are a small exception, though, and not the rule.) Once you have a library account, you can also borrow books.
* Please note that the CUNY School of Law does not allow other CUNY faculty, staff, or students to borrow books.
As a resident, student, or employee in New York City, you are eligible for library privileges at New York Public Library (with branches in Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island), Brooklyn Public Library, and Queens Public Library!
Unlike public libraries, academic libraries in New York City are not open to the public or to staff or students from other academic institutions. However, if there is a particular source that you've identified and you've located it at another New York academic library, you can ask for a NYC METRO Library card. This is a one-time pass so that you can visit a library. For one of these passes, please contact the CUNY Office of Library Service's Director of Collection and Metadata Strategy, Michael Hughes.
If you have a long-term research project that you think requires use of the NYU or Columbia libraries, you can learn about Manhattan Research Library Initiative (MaRLI). This initiative enables approved New York Public Library cardholders with a demonstrable research need not met by currently available resources, to borrow materials from NYU, Columbia, and NYPL.
Your library privileges are the same as those of Central Office staff members. However, you will first need the following:
No, you can order the book through the inter-CUNY delivery system (CLICS) and have it delivered to the CUNY library of your choice. You can have it delivered to any CUNY library that you live or work near.
You can search for a book in CUNY OneSearch. If you find a book in the results list, you can view the "How to Get It" section to see where copies of the book are available. Find a copy you wish to request and click on Hold. Follow the instructions (you will need your CUNY Login credentials) to select a pickup location. When the item is ready for pickup, you will receive an email notification within 2 to 7 business days. After receiving the notification, you'll have 10 days to pick up the book. Bring your ID to pick up the item.
Absolutely not! You can return any CUNY library book at any CUNY library.
The quickest way to get a book is to go right to the library that owns it. However, if the library is too far away or you don't need it that quickly, use the inter-CUNY delivery system (CLICS).
See also: How do I order a book through the inter-CUNY delivery system (CLICS)?
If your home library is one of the CUNY colleges, you should ask at that library about interlibrary loan (ILL). This is an international borrowing and lending system that makes books and other material available all over the world.
If your home library is CUNY Central, please send an email to ols-request@cuny.edu.
Yes! Anybody with an email account that ends in cuny.edu or cuny.tv can have a complimentary subscription to The New York Times Digital.
You can use the CUNY School of Law library on-site. However, unless you have a CUNY School of Law affiliation, you cannot access their password-protected databases or borrow their books.
If CUNY Central is your home library, you have access to Lexis-Nexis Academic from the list of CUNY Central's Library Electronic Resources. This is not the Lawyer's edition but it does contain a wealth of legal materials, including all state & federal cases and statutes & law reviews. You cannot access Westlaw.
If you have a different home library, you should ask a reference librarian at that library.
You can use CUNY OneSearch → to search across the CUNY catalog and most of our electronic resources. If you need help using OneSearch, please use the tool's help pages, found linked in the upper right-hand corner of every page in OneSearch.
You can find e-books, along with a vast array of e-resources and print materials, in CUNY OneSearch →.
Many of our e-books can only be downloaded chapter by chapter in PDF format. However, ProQuest Ebook Central (formerly known as ebrary), the large CUNY-wide subscription to e-books that contains over 100,000 titles, makes it possible to download entire e-books to your mobile devices.
Intructions for downloading e-books from ebrary →
You can become a deputy borrower for your manager by setting up a proxy borrowing account. The CUNY Libraries can only take the request for a proxy account from the manager, not the person who will borrow for the manager. Your manager must already have an account at the applicable campus library.
It is important that your manager know that they will be responsible for any lost or overdue book fines incurred in their name!
Please contact the applicable campus library for more information on setting up a proxy borrowing account.
Yes! You can contact the CUNY Office of Library Services's Director of Collection and Metadata Strategy, Michael Hughes. If he is not available, any of our staff will be happy to help you.