What you should know

Theses Non-Exclusive License

At the time you submit your thesis or dissertation to the Faculty of Graduate Studies at your university you will be asked to sign an agreement with Library and Archives Canada (LAC) entitled Theses Non-Exclusive License.

What exactly is this license? It's an agreement between you, the thesis author, and Library and Archives Canada that gives the LAC permission to include your thesis in the Theses Canada program. This program makes theses available by a number of different methods to anyone wanting to access them. Because the license is non-exclusive you can pursue any other publishing venture that you wish. The license clearly indicates that you continue to own the copyright in your thesis. Further, you keep your moral rights, i.e. the rights you retain over the integrity of the work and the right to be named as its author even after sale or transfer of the copyright.

Library and Archives Canada considers student participation in the Theses Canada program to be voluntary, in other words we do not require you to submit your thesis to us. However universities have different policies and you are advised to check with your Faculty of Graduate Studies regarding their policy on submission of theses to Library and Archives Canada.

If you do decide to participate in our program you must sign the Non-Exclusive License. Please read it carefully before you sign it and make sure that you thoroughly understand it. If you require more information about any of the clauses it contains you can contact us by e-mail at: theses@lac-bac.gc.ca or by telephone at 819-953-6221.

Note that it is not necessary to submit your thesis to Library and Archives Canada immediately if a patent is pending or if it contains sensitive or restricted information. It can be submitted at the appropriate time.

Why do we want your thesis at Library and Archives Canada? Our mission is to build a world-class national resource enabling Canadians to know their country and themselves through their documentary heritage and to provide an effective gateway to national and international sources of information. We consider your thesis an important source of original research. To that end, we'd like to add it to our collection and to preserve it for future generations of Canadians. We'd also like to make your work visible and accessible.

How do we accomplish this? Upon signing the license your university will submit your thesis to the Theses Canada program in one of two ways. If you submitted your thesis electronically LAC will harvest it directly from your university. If you submitted a print thesis your university will submit it to Theses Canada via our contractor, ProQuest. (Some universities may send electronic theses to ProQuest as well as to LAC). In either case you will be helping students, researchers, scholars and others to locate and access your thesis. This is particularly the case with electronic submission since there are no delays in making your thesis accessible worldwide.

In all cases submission to Theses Canada at Library and Archives Canada means that we will catalogue your thesis and make the bibliographic record available on the Theses Canada Portal. If we have harvested your thesis the URL in the bibliographic record will provide immediate access to the thesis itself. Whether you submit an electronic or print thesis it will be preserved in LAC's extensive collection of theses and dissertations.

Submission of theses through ProQuest provides several other features:

• Your thesis will be reproduced on preservation quality microfiche, which will be available on interlibrary loan from Library and Archives Canada.
• ProQuest is LAC's authorized sales agent and will make your thesis available for purchase on its ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Database.
• For theses submitted to ProQuest in print the digitzed version will be available on the Theses Canada Portal four years after ProQuest has digitized it.
• Authors can purchase discounted paper copies of their theses from ProQuest at the time of publication.
  
  Author Discount Offer Form [PDF 25 KB] [RTF 76 KB]. This is ProQuest's form. If you have any questions about it, please contact ProQuest at the number indicated on the form.

What about royalties on theses sold by ProQuest? In 2002, Library and Archives Canada (formerly the National Library of Canada), after consulting with the Conseil national des cycles supérieurs, the Graduate Students' Association of Canada and the National Graduate Caucus of the Canadian Federation of Students, negotiated a royalty-free service agreement with ProQuest, whereby ProQuest keeps the royalties generated by sales of theses in exchange for an equivalent reduction in their publishing fee.

Since ProQuest only pays royalties if seven or more copies of a thesis are sold in one calendar year this does not represent a significant financial loss to Canadian theses authors. An analysis of sales figures for 2002 indicates that approximately 1.25% of authors would have been eligible to receive royalties. Of those, 66% would have received less than $10.00 USD and 92% would have received less than $20.00 USD, or less than the publishing fee your university pays to have your thesis processed by ProQuest. Please note Theses Canada contributes a portion of the publishing fee for each thesis processed in the program and supports the program though the provision of services of two full-time employees among other things.

Theses Non-Exclusive License Form