EPIC guide
Using EPIC, schools have access to thousands of electronic resources covering all curriculum learning areas from primary to secondary level. It includes magazines, newspapers, encyclopedia, images, and much more.
What's EPIC?
EPIC (Electronic Purchasing In Collaboration) is a consortium of New Zealand library and information organisations that have purchased collective access to a wide range of quality e-resources.
The Ministry of Education is a member of EPIC and has made EPIC e-resources freely available to all New Zealand schools.
Benefits of EPIC for students and educators
EPIC provides a gateway to thousands of e-resources for students and staff to use at school and at home. It covers all learning areas and a huge range of topics.
You can access a rich range of:
- full-text magazines and newspapers
- biographies, encyclopedia and other reference works
- sound and video clips.
New Zealand content is also included. Many of the resources are updated daily.
Benefits for students
- Articles are professionally curated, often peer-reviewed.
- Students get enhanced access to quick, fact-finding information and more in-depth coverage of topics, which supports scaffolding of next steps in learning.
- Students with accessibility issues (e.g. impaired vision) have articles that have been made accessible in a number of ways, including being read aloud.
- EPIC provides 24/7 access to quality e-resources that otherwise may not be available to them.
- Contemporary content often appears on EPIC before it's available in a published magazine or journal.
Benefits for educators, including school leaders
- EPIC e-resources expand your library's collections and teacher resource room/departmental resources to meet informational and professional reading needs across the curriculum.
- You can access sample lesson plans and training resources, including interactive resources, videos, tip sheets, and scavenger-hunt activities.
- EPIC enhances the school’s e-learning environment with access to quality, up-to-date digital content.
- You'll have access to research articles on the education sector, modern learning environments (including school libraries) and learning and teaching programmes.
- EPIC includes online study guides and interactive lessons for finding, evaluating and reusing resources responsibly and safely (digital citizenship) to help enrich your staff professional learning programmes.
- Many of the resources in EPIC integrate seamlessly with Google Classroom and Google Drive.
How to access and use EPIC e-resources
- Click EPIC resources for New Zealand schools.
- Search for a resource using the EPIC Discovery search box or select from the resources listed on the page.
- If your school is networked through the Network for Learning (N4L) managed network, you can access EPIC resources directly (with no login required) from within the school network. Otherwise, you will be prompted for your EPIC school login details.
Accessing EPIC resources has more details.
Linking to EPIC resources explains how to set up your own direct access to EPIC resources in your Library Management System, or on your intranet or internet pages.
Find out more
For general enquiries, email epic@dia.govt.nz, or phone 04 474 3058.
Responsible use — copyright and attribution
When you use any of the digital resources included in EPIC, be aware of their copyright requirements and usage restrictions. These are usually made clear on each website or database.
It's important that you acknowledge or attribute that you use in your work. Check if your school has guidelines for responsible use of other people's work.
If you're unsure about how to use these digital resources responsibly, ask your librarian or refer to:
- Copyright guidelines for schools — as set out by the Ministry of Education.
- Creative Commons — a non-profit organisation that helps people legally share, reuse, and even remix creative products and knowledge.
- National Library copyright and privacy — statements about the use of National Library web content and information.