Guidelines for Fair Use in Education

Few guidelines have been established to define the extent of fair use and even fewer have emerged to address the complex questions of digital fair use. This is largely due to the wide variety of copyrightable works and the new ways these works may be used in the academic setting.

The guidelines provided in the following sections have been developed from a variety of sources external to the University of Washington and do not address every situation that may arise.

UW has not adopted official guidelines for determining fair use.

Uses Not in Guidelines
If your particular use is not covered by the guidelines, it does not mean your use is not a fair use, only that no guidelines have been developed. Similarly, if your use exceeds the limits imposed in the guidelines, your use may still be a fair use.

If your use is not covered by the guidelines, a thorough analysis of the fair use factors is required.