Interlibrary Loan is a free service available to current Long Beach City College students, faculty, and staff. If the book or article you need for your academic research is not held in the Long Beach City College Library, Interlibrary Loan (ILL) can try to obtain it for you from other libraries, both in this country and abroad.
The following materials are not available through Interlibrary Loan (ILL):
required textbooks, recreational reading, recently published books, computer software, rare books/original manuscripts/special collections, entire volumes or issues of periodicals, and some dissertations and theses.
Most requested items arrive in between 7-14 working days. Requests made during peak periods may take longer, up to six weeks, especially if the materials are only available from out-of-state libraries. The average loan period for a book borrowed from another library is 3 weeks (21 days). Photocopies of articles are yours to keep.
When you need a book, after first verifying that it is not in our Long Beach City College collection by checking our Voyager online catalog, we recommend that you next try searching the catalogs of California State University Long Beach and Long Beach Public Library to see if you can borrow the book directly from one of those libraries before initiating an interlibrary loan request. If the book you need is available through these libraries, it should arrive more quickly than through an interlibrary loan request.
Librarians are happy to work with faculty, staff, and students who may need to use other sources of information for their research activities and may be able to help you find alternative resources in the Library to serve your purposes.
Placing a Request
Forms for requesting interlibrary loan are available at the Library's Circulation Desk and are now available on the Web in electronic format.
You must have a valid Long Beach City College identification card before you can request interlibrary loan materials, both in person and electronically.
Please check the holdings of the Long Beach City College Library to see if we have the item before submitting your request:
- Search Long Beach City College's online catalog, Voyager
- Search for an article in our online databases
- Search California State University Long Beach's catalog
- See the California State University Long Beach borrowing policy for Long Beach City College students
- Search the Long Beach Public Library catalog
- Go to the Interlibrary Loan FAQ page
Place your Interlibrary Loan Electronic book Request
Place your Interlibrary Loan Electronic article Request
If you have questions about the Long Beach City College Interlibrary Loan Service, see the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) information.
