Services
Explore the many services we offer, from borrowing materials from other libraries to placing items for your students to use…even renewing books when you need a little more time.
Access to the Stacks is restricted on both campuses. Library staff will help you retrieve any physical items you require.
Interlibrary Loan
Our Interlibrary Loan service allows current PNW faculty, staff, and students to borrow material that is not owned by our library. Your request can be submitted through Tipasa, our cloud-based management system that enables users to place, track, and keep a history of requests from a personal online account.
Books are generally delivered within 7 days and articles within a few days. The loan period of physical items are subject to the lending libraries’ policies and the articles are yours to keep.
Each user must register for an account in Tipasa.
In very rare cases, a fee might be required for the requested item. If this is the case, the patron will be contacted by the interlibrary loan staff for approval to proceed with the request.
User Instructions
New Tipasa Users
- Click on the box, “Hammond Campus Tipasa” or “Westville Campus Tipasa” depending on where you want to receive your material
- Click the “CREATE ACCOUNT” link
- You will be taken to a screen where you are instructed to enter identifying pieces of information to create your account
- Click “CREATE”
- You may now login with the account credentials just created
Users who had an ILLiad account will need to do the following the first time at Tipasa login:
- Click the box, “Hammond Campus Tipasa” or “Westville Campus Tipasa” depending on where you want to receive your material
- Click the “FORGOT PASSWORD” link
- You will be taken to a screen where you are instructed to enter your PNW email address
- After entering your email address, click “REQUEST NEW PASSWORD”
- An email will be sent to your PNW email address with instructions and a link to set your password in Tipasa
Contact Information
Hammond Campus
Student Union Library (SULB) Building – Second Floor
(219) 989-2224
libillin@pnw.edu
Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Westville Campus
Library-Student-Faculty (LSF) Building – Second Floor
(219) 785-5248
PNW_IPN@pnw.edu
Monday to Friday: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Inter-Campus Transfer
Inter-Campus Transfer is a free service the PNW Library provides to all patrons. If you need material from either campus you can request the library materials from our library’s homepage. Shipping usually takes 4-5 business days. Once the item arrives at the campus you chose, you will be contacted by email. Items are kept at the Public Service Desk and can be picked up at your convenience. If the items are not picked up after 7 days, they will be shipped back to their home Library.
Process for submitting an inter-campus loan request.
From the Library’s homepage
- Search for the book/subject you are looking for. Your search will provide a list of books, article, and eBook that the library owns
- Log in using your Purdue career account
- Once logged and found the book, you can click on “Find in Print” to see the availability and requesting information
- Click on Request
Course Reserves
Reserves are course materials which University Instructors make available for their students to use.
Leganto is our new course e-reserve service that makes it easy to create, access, and manage course resource lists. Instructors can build, maintain, and share resource lists of all material types and library staff can provide resources efficiently.
Students and faculty have access to course materials 24/7 through Brightspace.
Reserve Locations
Available digitally via Brightspace.
Reserve FAQs
Who can access a Reserve?
- Purdue University Northwest Faculty, students, and staff
How do I find a Reserve?
- Easily access lists of course reserves in Brightspace
How long can I access a Reserve?
- Reserve materials can be viewed and accessed for the period designated by the instructor
Advantages of Reserves in Brightspace:
- Students easily access lists for all their courses in one place 24/7
- Engage with the resources, comment on readings, make recommendations for your class and the library
- Build a personal collection of resources to use at other times
How do I place material on Reserve?
- Create lists of relevant, up-to-date materials gathered from a range of sources including the Library collection, eBooks, scholarly articles, videos, newspaper articles, websites, etc. utilizing Leganto to add to their courses in Brightspace
Interested in learning more about E-Reserves?
What may be placed on Reserve?
- E-books
- Articles available online or uploaded
- Old exams, lecture notes, study guides
- Videos and other media
What may not be placed on Reserve?
- Multiple scanned copies (Copyright Law)
How long does material remain on Reserve?
- Reading list can stay in Brightspace until removed by Instructor
- Instructors can also set it to have certain material viewable for a limited amount of time
Why use Leganto?
- 24 hour access to course material
- Easily manage and update course resources based on your course needs
- Look at statistical usage of materials by students
- Set your list to be viewed by your students only, or any student
Laptop Checkout for Students
Each campus library has a set of Dell Latitude Laptops and Chromebooks for our PNW students to borrow. Laptops/Chromebooks can be checked out at the Public Services Desk. They are first come first serve basis and we do not allow holds.
Borrowing a laptop
- Laptops are available to students for semester checkouts
- To borrow a laptop, you will need your student ID card
- The laptop will have a specific login and password issued to you upon checkout
- By borrowing a laptop, you are agreeing to the “Laptop Loan Regulations”(see below)
Returning a laptop
- Please return laptops to the PNW library
- Laptop loans cannot be renewed, however, depending on the availability of laptops, a student may check out a different laptop when they return the first one
- Laptops are loaned to currently enrolled Purdue University Northwest students
- Laptops are loaned out for the semester
- Laptop loans are not subject to renewal. However, depending on the availability of laptops, a student may check out a different laptop when they return the first one
- Students understand anything saved to the computer should be saved to a flash drive or their google docs
- A student’s privilege to check out a laptop will be revoked for two months after their 3rd time receiving a long-overdue notice
- Students will be notified of their second “excessive overdue” occurrence that a third instance will result in the suspension of borrowing privileges
- Students are responsible for any damage or loss sustained while the student has a laptop checked out
- Laptops are checked out on a first-come, first-serve basis. There is no waiting list
- Please do not try your own repair and improvement projects on the equipment. While it may be very tempting to open up the computer and check out what’s inside, please don’t. The computers are under warranty through both the computer vendor and through PNW. However, if the computer shows signs of tampering, there is a chance the warranty will be void and any repair costs will come back to you
- Students will be charged replacement fees for any/all equipment that is missing or damaged
- Printing is available through wireless printing through PaperCut.
Recommend a Purchase
Looking to recommend a purchase to the PNW library? Here’s the process.
Please search PRIMO, the library’s search and discovery tool, to verify library holdings before submitting a request for purchase.
If you are requesting a purchase, please supply us with as much bibliographic information as possible. For bibliographic information, you can search WorldCat, online booksellers or publishers’ catalogs.
Ready recommend a purchase to the library?
For more information, contact Collection Development Coordinator Sammy Chapman at schapma@pnw.edu or (219) 989-2903.
Request an Instruction Session
PNW library liaisons have expertise in specific areas and can work directly with faculty, staff and students to provide programs, services and library collections.
Request a Library Instruction Session
- Please book your sessions as early in the semester as possible. We ask for one-week advance notice so we can prepare.
- Faculty are asked to meet with librarian as soon as possible, bringing a syllabus and an assignment for session preparation.
- Instructors should plan to be present for the session.
- One session is good, but multiple sessions can really re-inforce information literacy learning.
The library uses screen sharing software that allows you to see a librarian’s computer screen from your computer off campus to view a personalized demonstration on library resources. Contact your subject specialist to make an appointment via email or by telephone at the numbers below.
- Hammond: 219-989-2676.
- Westville: 219-785-5248.
Library Liaisons

Joseph Coates
Reference Librarian Manager/University Archives
(219) 989-2063
SULB 203F
LSF 245




Library Database/Technical Matters
