Intellectual property

1. ACAS shall own the copyright on materials created by staff members when it is done as part of employment activities for which the staff member was directed by ACAS and paid as an employee.
    
2. If a staff member is the author of academic materials, they retain the moral right to be named as its author, even if ACAS owns the copyright.
    
3. Staff members shall own all other intellectual property they create in their own time and not using ACAS resources or materials, even when it relates to their area of academic interest. Examples of the above:
    
   Example 1
   ACAS asks Brad to write a textbook as part of his role as a staff member. Time is allocated in his list of duties as an employee. ACAS fully owns the copyright on it.
    
   Example 2
   Brad writes a textbook in his spare time. Even though he discussed the idea with his supervisor, no time is allocated in his list of duties as an employee. Brad fully owns the copyright on it.
    
   Example 3
   ACAS gets external funding for Brad to write a textbook. ACAS then asks Brad to write it and allocates time in his list of duties as an employee, and pays Brad from the grant. ACAS fully owns the copyright on it.
    
4. Students shall own any intellectual property they create, unless they specifically agree otherwise in writing.
    
5. Staff members may not require a student to surrender their intellectual property unless the student is paid as an employee to generate it under the same terms as staff members.
    
6. When staff and students produce intellectual property jointly, they shall share jointly both ownership and the moral rights.
    
7. Staff members or students who plagiarize or infringe intellectual property in any manner shall be referred to the prinipal for discipline.
    
8. When staff or students substantially reproduce ideas from some other source, even if they do not infringe the copyright, they must give credit to the source.
    
   Example:
   Jade used the basic idea from another article as the basis for her own essay. She is required to reference the other author.
    
9. Recordings of instruction given in the course of ACAS educational or other activities (including, but not limited to video, audio) shall remain the property of those who generated them, but ACAS will gain unrestricted and free license to use them for their internal purposes.
    
   Example
   Brad makes a video recording of himself teaching. Brad owns the intellectual property on the recording, but ACAS has the right to use it for other teaching within ACAS. However, ACAS can’t sell it or hire it outside ACAS.
    
   
10. The purpose of this policy is to ensure that, when a staff member produces material specifically for an ACAS course and owns copyright on it, the ACAS course provider can still use that material even if the staff member leaves the program. When a staff member produces materials for an ACAS course:
    1. The staff member automatically licenses the provider of that ACAS course to use those materials for the ACAS program for which it was written, including any subsequent replacement courses.
    2. The provider of the ACAS course may be either the ACAS center or an ACAS auspicee.
    3. The license shall entitle the licensee to continue to use, modify, and reproduce those materials without royalty or payment of any kind whatsoever for use with its own students.
    4. This is a condition of employment, whether the staff member is paid or voluntary.
    5. The ownership of copyright is a separate matter and will follow the other regulations as above.
    6. If the materials are written as commercial publications for sale to students, the provision of materials shall continue under the same terms.

Example
LMN College is an auspicee of ACAS and runs a course under ACAS auspices. Karen is the administrator and Jeff is a staff member.
Jeff writes a textbook for LMN College to be used in the course, so LMN College automatically has a license as defined above. During the year, Jeff disagrees with Karen and resigns. LMN College is entitled to continue using the textbook, even though Jeff still owns copyright on it. At the end of the year, the instructors make changes to improve the textbook, and will use it again in the future.

 

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