Access to Other Libraries
Columbia University Libraries is part of a number of consortial partnerships and reciprocal agreements where current students, faculty, and staff have access to other institutions.
When visiting another institution, view the policies of the institution(s) before planning a visit. Items, collections, and participating libraries available vary by institution. Material circulates according to the lending library’s policies and loan periods. Restrictions are set by each home institution and may vary across institution.
If you are a current Columbia University student, faculty, or staff member looking to visit one of our partner institutions, more information about our partnerships may be found below. When visiting these institutions, you may be asked to show your physical Columbia University ID card and/or government-issued photo ID.
If you are from an institutional partner and are seeking access to Columbia University Libraries, please check our Approved Visitors and Partnerships webpage for more information on visiting.
The 2CUL partnership is a reciprocal access and borrowing program for current students, faculty, and staff members of Columbia University and Cornell University. Please note that this agreement excludes affiliates of Weill Cornell Medical Library in NYC.
As part of the 2CUL initiative, Columbia students, faculty, and staff may register to borrow books at Cornell University. Information about this initiative, and a link to the registration form may be found here.
Borrow Direct Plus is a reciprocal access and borrowing program for current students, faculty, and staff members of the Ivies+ institutions, which includes:
- Brown University
- Cornell University
- Dartmouth College
- Duke University
- Harvard University
- John Hopkins University
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
- Princeton University
- Stanford University
- University of Chicago
- University of Pennsylvania
- Yale University
Through the Borrow Direct Plus on-site borrowing program, current Columbia University and Union Theological Seminary students, faculty, and staff have on-site library borrowing privileges at these institutions. View the policies of the institution(s) before planning a visit.
MaRLI (the Manhattan Research Library Initiative) enables NYU and Columbia doctoral students, full-time faculty and librarians, and approved New York Public Library cardholders with a demonstrable research need not met by currently available resources, to borrow materials from all three institutions.
For more information and to register for MaRLI privileges, please visit the MaRLI website.
METRO referrals provide courtesy access to many academic, school, public, and special libraries throughout New York City and Westchester County. Through METRO's referral program, library users can search across METRO's member libraries for a specific book or item, or can visit another member library to view materials across entire subject areas.
To access another institution using a METRO referral, please reach out to the reference team via the Ask A Librarian webpage.
New York University and Columbia have reciprocal access for current students, faculty, and staff.
These privileges typically include reading privileges and access to collections. Use of electronic and computing resources may be restricted. Borrowing privileges are not provided.Students, faculty and staff have access to the NYU libraries described here.
SHARES is a reciprocal access program that gives each participating institution’s current faculty, students, and staff on-site access to partnering institutions. Columbia students, faculty and staff are entitled to physical access privileges to SHARES institutions outside of New York City.
These privileges typically include reading privileges and access to collections. Use of electronic and computing resources may be restricted. Borrowing privileges are not provided. Please consult the websites of member institutions in advance.