Setting up an open access publication fund

Stephen Pinfield

University of Nottingham

Open access (OA) mandates

• UK: RCUK– AHRC– BBSRC– ESRC– MRC– NERC– STFC

• UK: charities/ independent funders– British Heart Foundation– Cancer Research UK– Wellcome Trust– etc

• International– Government and

independent funders

Routes to open access

• Publication in OA or ‘hybrid’ journal

• Deposit in OA repository

• ‘Open access’: where the full content can be freely and immediately accessed and reused in an unrestricted way

Publishers and prices: examplesPublisher OA option Price

American Chemical Society Author Choice $3000

American Institute of Physics Author Select $1500-$2500

American Physical Society Free to Read $975-$1300

Blackwell Online Open $2600

British Medical Journal Publishing BMJ Unlocked $2220-$3145

Cambridge University Press Cambridge Open $2700

Elsevier Sponsorship Option $3000

Oxford University Press Oxford Open $1500-$2800

Professional Engineering Publishing (IME) Engineering Open Choice £1700

Routledge iOpenAccess $3250

Royal Society EXIS Open Choice $278-400 and $16 per page for first 6-10 pages, $93 per page thereafter

Royal Society of Chemistry RSC Open Science £1000-£2500

Sage Sage Open $3000

Springer Open Choice $3000

Taylor and Francis iOpenAccess $3250

Implications for institutions

• What do these (inter)national developments mean for individual institutions?

• What policies, facilities and services do institutions need to be put in place?

• How can researchers be helped to pay open-access charges?

Funder policies: Wellcome

• Direct grants• Contingency funds• Institutional funds for ‘top 30’

Funder policies: Research Councils

• Directly-Incurred Costs– “For Research Council grants, publication fees may be

included as a directly-incurred cost under the ‘Other’ costs heading on the standard electronic application form.”*

• Indirect Costs: Full Economic Costs– “If universities do set up such [publication] funds, they

will form part of the cost base used for calculating their standard rate for the indirect costs of research.”*

* RIN Briefing Note on Payment of Publication Fees

Institutional requirements• Establish clear management arrangements for

Wellcome and other funders’ grants• Set up funds in institutions (from fEC) to cover OA

charges– Centrally managed? Devolved?– Calculating fEC cost base

• Agree policies for researchers not funded by relevant funders

• Consider relationship to library funding• Develop clear institutional policy documents• Undertake institution-wide publicity • Provide proactive support for academics

Case study: recommendations to Nottingham Research Committee*

1. All authors should be encouraged to deposit copies of their papers in the Nottingham ePrints repository; papers will then be forwarded to other repositories as appropriate.

2. The University should identify a central budget upon which all authors in the institution can call to fund publication/OA charges.

3. Wellcome-funded authors should be reminded of the availability of funds to pay for their publication/OA charges.

4. Further internal publicity should be carried out in order to inform academic staff of the new requirements of funders.

5. Arrangements should be put in place to monitor the University’s compliance with funder requirements.

* Adopted November 2006

Case study: Nottingham OA fund

• Set up as a partnership between Research Innovation Services (RIS) and Information Services

• Approved by University Research Committee in November 2006; procedures document approved in March 2007

• Administered centrally by RIS• Designed to fund OA charges (for OA or hybrid journals) not

page/colour charges• Available to all members of the University regardless of

their source of research funding• Currently being monitored, but not rationed• Additional funds; not diverted from periodical purchases• To date, low usage: 75 requests in 18 months, average cost

per article of about £1400

Institutional actions• Establish policies for managing Wellcome and

other OA funds• Create general funds for all authors to cover

OA charges• Agree implications for fEC cost base• Set up institutional repository• Finalise and implement clear procedures• Carry out awareness raising• Provide proactive support

References• SHERPA JULIET (funder policies)

http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/juliet/

• SHERPA ROMEO (publisher copyright policies)http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo

• RIN Briefing Note on Payment of Publication Feeshttp://www.rin.ac.uk/files/Briefing%20Note%201%20-%20Payment%20of%20Publication%20Fees.pdf