Creative Commons licenses provide a standardized way for authors and creators to grant the public permission to share and use their creative works. Creative Commons licenses mix and match the following elements:

	Attribution (BY) Give credit to the original author
	Share Alike (SA) Distribute derivative works under the same license
	Non-Commercial (NC) Only use the work for noncommercial purposes
	No Derivatives (ND) Only use verbatim copies of the work

Students within the academic are required to refer to and use a number of work created by others. Much of what a student does while at university is covered by exceptions to copyright.

As a student, you can rely on what’s called ‘fair dealing for research or study’.

This exception allows you to reproduce limited copyright material both for your own reference and in your assignments. 

• 10% of the pages, or one chapter, from a hard-copy source
• 10% of the number of words from an electronic source
• One article from an edition or issue of a periodical
  • More than one article from a single issue or edition is permitted provided the articles are to be used for the same research or course of study

You can also reproduce images and other media in your coursework, but the use must be ‘fair’. In order for the exception to apply, your work (assignments, etc.) must only be available to you, your classmates and your lecturer or tutor for assessment in that course of study.

Information on the Internet:

You might be under the assumption that copyright does not apply to information that you find on the internet. Information found on the internet is covered by copyright for digital publishing. It is better to assume that all information is protected by copyright.

Early on you will be taught how to use referencing style to acknowledge work that you use in your projects and assignments. 

It is also useful to understand how creative commons work. Using information from creative commons and open source material will allow you to avoid some of issues related to permission and copyright during your course of study.

During the course of your studies if you create any work ie projects, involve yourself in scientific research and publish your results in a journal or present a poster then the work is automatically copyrighted to you.There may be times when the university might request you grant permission to use your work for promotional and educational purposes.

In exceptional circumstances as an undergraduate student or masters student you might have been heavily supported by the university to develop an Intellectual property with clear commercial potential. In such cases there may be an agreement that the sponsoring body will require from creators of intellectual property.