Graduate Students

Subject Guides

Visit your subject guide to find specialized search tools for specific subject areas or programs (e.g. databases for peer-reviewed articles), along with other research tips.

Omni

Omni is the Library search tool. Use it to find books, articles, films, music scores, and more. See Getting Started with Omni for a quick tutorial.

More Research Materials will help you find out how to access specific types of research resources like news articles, videos, music, statistics, and theses.

Tutorials & Workshops

There are many short online tutorials to help with tips and strategies for your research.

You can find and register for library research workshops for graduate students (most of them are offered live via Zoom).

The Library offers several workshops through ASPIRE, a professional skills development program for graduate students. 

You can choose to complete the ASPIRE Professional Development Certificate. It is part of the Laurier Experience Record, a comprehensive record of your involvement in curricular and co-curricular experiential learning at Laurier. 

Citation Management

The Library offers training and assistance with two free citation management tools: Zotero and Mendeley.

For more information, contact your subject librarian.

Research Data Management

The Library provides a variety of RDM services, including:

• One-on-one training and consultation services for writing data management plans with DMP Assistant. These services help satisfy DMP-related requirements from Tri-Agency and many other grant bodies. 
• Data deposit and data curation services with its Dataverse repository that will provide a home for your data findings and meet your Tri-Agency data deposit requirements.

For more information, contact researchdata@wlu.ca.

Laurier Archives

Laurier Archives and Special Collections is the Library's research collection of archival records, thematic special collections, and rare books, with emphases on Wilfrid Laurier University, the environmental conservation movement in Canada, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada and its Eastern Synod, music in Kitchener-Waterloo, and the history of Waterloo Region.

For more information, contact libarch@wlu.ca.

Digital Projects and Curation

The Library is cultivating an environment that provides consultations to faculty or students wishing to conduct research involving digital technology including research in Digital Humanities. 

For more information, visit Digital Projects and Curation or contact Mona Elayyan, Digital Projects and Curation Librarian: melayyan@wlu.ca.

Scholarly Communication

The Library's scholarly communication initiatives cover a wide variety of activities, including maintaining an institutional repository, working with publishers, supporting open access, and providing article processing charge discounts.

For more information, visit Scholarly Communication.

Course Reserves

There is a link to Course Reserves in each MyLearningSpace course. That's where you can find assigned books, articles, chapters, videos, etc. You can also find them here: Course Reserves.

Borrowing Policies & Privileges

You can borrow many books for 120 days. That's a whole term! Sign-in to My Account for your list of books borrowed with due dates. 

Your privileges include borrowing books and other resources from 19 university libraries. You'll see results from these libraries when you use Omni (the Library search tool). 

See General Borrowing Policies for more information.

Borrowing from Other Libraries

You can request books, articles, etc., from other libraries in Omni (the Library search tool). If the resource you want isn't in Omni, you can submit a Resource Sharing Request Form.

See Request from Other Libraries for more information.

Scan on Demand & Mail on Demand

Use Scan on Demand to request digital copies of physical journal articles or book chapters from the Laurier Library print collection in Waterloo and Mail on Demand to request free home delivery of items from the Omni catalogue. 

Canadian University Reciprocal Borrowing Agreement  

Laurier students and faculty may also borrow directly from other Canadian university libraries through the Canadian University Reciprocal Borrowing Agreement. 

Some Universities may still require an IUBP card. This card may be obtained from the help desk in the library at the Waterloo campus. 

Graduate Commons

Visit the Graduate Commons on the 3rd floor of the our Waterloo campus library. 

It's a large study space just for graduate students with group study rooms, individual study space, tables for group discussion and comfy chairs. Access it with your OneCard.

General Study Areas

In Waterloo, Kitchener, and Brantford library locations, you'll find spaces for individual study, group study, and more. Some rooms can be reserved. 

See Study Areas for details.

Printing, Photocopying, & Scanning

These amenities are available on the 2nd and 3rd floors of the Waterloo campus library and at the Kitchener library.

See Printing, Photocopying, & Scanning for details. 

Computers & Technology

The Library offers a variety of technologies, including computer workstations, equipment for media viewing and listening, microform readers, and more.

See Computers and Technology for details.