Get Textbooks: Get Textbooks

How to borrow textbooks (required course texts):

There are multiple ways to make getting your textbooks affordable

• Talk with your student financial aid advisor
• Work with the staff of Penn First Plus
• Use your library!

The Libraries’ collections include nearly nine million print and electronic books. We might have one of the books that you need for your course! Books circulate for the semester.

You can also request books from our partner libraries. Have a question contact your librarian or submit a question or chat. 

Follow these steps:

• Log into Franklin Catalog – this will allow you to see all of your options.
• Search Franklin catalog by book title (include author and edition if possible. Many textbooks have multiple editions and similar titles)

• If you find a record for a print book – it should have a location and call number
• Look for "available" in the status/location line as in illustrations above and below
• The record above shows the locations as LIBRA and the Holman Biotech Commons. If the book is in the stacks of any of our libraries on campus such as the Holman Biotech Commons or Van Pelt you are welcome to go to that library and retrieve it from the stacks yourself OR you can request the book and have it held for you at the library of your choosing.
• If the location of the book is LIBRA or the GIC Collection at Penn Libraries, you must request the book.
• See the illustration below: Click the space under "Select an Item"—you will choose the item and location and “Request in Print”
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  • Then you will be able to choose the location from which you’d like to pick up your book

    

    • If the book you find through your Franklin catalog search is an e-book, you can click directly through to the book.
    • In the illustration below you would click on "DOAB Directory" or "SpringerLink."

    

    • Can’t find it? Try searching through our partner libraries collections—BorrowDirect and EZBorrow
    • Questions or need help? The libraries have live chat from 9-5 Monday through Friday, submit a question online, or find out who your subject librarian is—any subject librarian can help you request that we look into purchasing a book for the collection.

    Search Franklin Online Catalog

Sign up to be part of the “GIC Collection at Penn Libraries” group: https://tinyurl.com/GICPennLibraries. 

Being part of this group allows you to borrow materials from the special collection that is designed for first-generation highly aided students. You will know it when you see the location: GIC Collection at Penn Libraries as in the illustration above. (Don't limit yourself to these books -- the whole collection is available to you.)

Once your are signed on to the GIC Collection at Penn Group (use the tiny URL above), you will have a different view of the catalog and see that the copies, appearing above as "restricted access," will appear as "available." 

Follow the steps in the left hand column of this guide to request the book and arrange to pick it up at your favorite library.