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Once you have proofread your book, you must check it in for approval. A staff member or qualified volunteer will review it and either approve it or return it for more editing with notes about what to fix. Your book will typically reviewed within 7 business days of... more
It depends. Proofreaders may choose any book to proofread, just like scanners may choose any book to scan. The time in which your book will be proofread will depend on how well the book is scanned, how long or complicated the book is, and whether or not a proofreader... more
OCR is short for "Optical Character Recognition" and it is a type of software that we require scanners to use. It turns a picture of text into computer-readable text so that our books may be read in different formats.
For quality control, we ask that different people scan and proofread each book. Occasionally we will make an exception for a highly-skilled, experienced volunteer. If you would like to be considered for this exception, please Request Help.
Yes! When you submit your newly scanned version, make sure to put the letters "BSO" in all capitals before the title of the book so that proofreaders know that you're improving an existing copy.Check out this page for more information about BSOs.
If you're having trouble uploading a scanned RTF (Rich Text Format) file, try skipping the step where you input the ISBN the first time. This does mean that you'll have to put in a bit more information manually, but it hopefully will solve the uploading problem. Do... more
You may scan any book you choose, so long as it follows the guidelines on this page. The book should not be in the collection * and must be a physical book that is manually scanned.* See exceptions here.
Yes. Bookshare volunteers must use their own scanner and OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software. The scanner may have built-in OCR software, or the person scanning may have the OCR software as part of a computer program.
Bookshare cannot accept:eBooks (even if they have been printed and scanned)standardized teststeacher editions of textbookscopyrighted dramatic works (plays or screenplays)
Yes! The Wish List is a list of books that have been requested by our members for reading outside of the classroom. We encourage volunteers to check this list regularly and choose titles to scan and proof. Adding a Wist List title guarantees that you will make... more
Image Description volunteers advance the accessibility of the Bookshare collection by describing images in textbooks and childrens' books, using our open-source Poet Image Description tool developed by our DIAGRAM Center. Since we launched Poet in 2012, our volunteers... more
When a volunteer's scanned or proofread book is approved into Bookshare®'s collection, both the scanner and the proofreader automatically earn Volunteer Reward Credits. These credits can be used to reduce the cost of a Bookshare membership* for a person with a... more