Is this a common or viable thing? I don’t wanna come off as a leech so I was wondering the best way to go about it.
I’ve never heard of it and I don’t know why anyone would accommodate that request.
Some courses at some colleges have publicly accessible course materials.
You may raise suspicions if you are emailing from an email account not from the college:
http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2016/12/fake-student-emails-professors-asking-to-see-syllabi-university-issues-security-alert
http://professorconfess.blogspot.com/2017/02/leftist-courses-targeted-by.html