Emory University
AC-11: Open Access to Research

Emory University faculty established an Open Access Policy in 2011 to promote greater reach and impact for articles, assist Emory authors with the retention of distribution rights, and ensure preservation. OpenEmory: Created in response to the OA Policy, OpenEmory is an open-access repository of scholarly works by Emory faculty, including journal articles, books, book chapters, conference papers, posters, presentations, and reports. Emory Theses and Dissertations (ETDs): An open-access repository of Emory student theses and dissertations. Dataverse: Emory's open data repository, offered through a partnership between Emory and the Odum Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The following Open Access Policy was unanimously approved by the Faculty Council at the March 15, 2011 meeting. This text was revised based on faculty feedback and through Faculty Council discussions. Open Access Policy Text:  "The Faculty of Emory University is committed to disseminating the fruits of its research and scholarship as widely as possible. In addition to the public benefit of such dissemination, this policy is intended to serve faculty interests by promoting greater reach and impact for articles, assisting authors' retention of distribution rights, and ensuring preservation. In keeping with these commitments, the Faculty calls upon Emory University, through its Libraries, to create an open-access repository of faculty-authored scholarly articles1. Each faculty member grants Emory University permission to capture and make available his or her scholarly articles the author has chosen to distribute as open access and to reproduce and distribute those articles for open dissemination. In legal terms, each Faculty member grants to Emory University a nonexclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free, worldwide license to exercise any rights under copyright relating to each of his or her scholarly articles the author has chosen to distribute as open access, in any medium, and to authorize others to do the same, provided that the articles are not sold for a profit. The Emory Faculty author remains the copyright owner unless that author chooses to transfer the copyright to a publisher. Scholarly articles authored or co-authored while anyone is a member of the Faculty would be eligible for deposit in the repository unless the Faculty member entered into an incompatible licensing or assignment agreement, such as transferring all copyrights to a publisher. Emory Faculty may embargo scholarly articles from distribution for a specified period if a publishing agreement made by the Faculty member is determined to be incompatible with immediate distribution in Emory's repository. To assist the University in distributing the scholarly articles, each Faculty member may choose to provide an electronic copy of the final author's version of the article at no charge to the Libraries in an appropriate format (such as PDF) specified by the Libraries. The Libraries may make the article available to the public in Emory's open-access repository. In cases where an embargo period has been specified, the article may be archived in an Emory repository without open access for the period of the embargo, or a complete citation for the article may be submitted when deposit in the repository is incompatible with an assignment made by the faculty member. This policy applies to scholarly articles for which the faculty author is the copyright owner as defined in Emory's Intellectual Property Policy (Policy 7.6). Any question as to whether a faculty member is the copyright owner of a scholarly article shall be resolved as provided in Emory's Intellectual Property Policy. The Faculty calls upon the Library Policy Committee (LPC), the Provost's Office, and the Libraries, in collaboration with the Faculty Council, to develop and monitor an implementation plan for this policy. The LPC and Libraries, in consultation with the Provost's Office, will submit annual reports to the Faculty Council for the first three years of the policy implementation. The policy and service model will be reviewed after three years and a recommendation on revisions to the policy presented to the Faculty Council. 1. A scholarly article is defined here as in the Budapest Open Access Initiative, which scholars give to the world without expectation of payment. This encompasses peer-reviewed journal articles and any unreviewed preprints that they may wish to put online. (https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/opening-access-research) 2. For this policy, a Faculty member is a person employed at Emory under the Faculty Handbook with either a continuous or limited appointment. (http://provost.emory.edu/faculty/handbook/)"

Emory University's Open Access Publishing Fund provides funds to make it easier for Emory authors to publish in open access (OA) journals and books when no alternative funding is available. The goal is to foster the exploration of new and innovative publishing models across research communities. For this fund, we adhere to SPARC’s definition of Open Access, which states that “Open Access is the free, immediate, online availability of high-quality, peer-reviewed research results.” Current Emory University faculty, post-docs, researchers, and graduate and undergraduate students are eligible to apply. Excluded from eligibility are adjunct/visiting faculty or alumni without an eligible Emory co-author. Funds are awarded on a first-come, first-served basis. The maximum reimbursement is $1,500 per article or book. Funds may be used for open-access publishing and processing fees, including open-access page charges.

Open access journals are available on the internet for free, and may also have Creative Commons licenses allowing re-use of the content. They often do not require the transfer of the author’s copyright to the journal. Emory hosts several open-access journals, including Southern Spaces, Practical Matters, and Molecular Vision. The Emory University Scholarly Communications Office (SCO) offers a variety of services for Emory faculty, staff, and students. We also coordinate and support three open-access repositories and offer funding to make Emory authors’ research available in eligible open-access venues. SCO is available to answer questions about author agreements and book contracts, copyrights, open-access publications, permissions, and more. SCO provides assistance reviewing author agreements, book contracts, as well as copyright issues, including fair use, classroom guidelines, how to obtain permissions for scholarly publications, and identifying copyright holders. SCO can help with selecting an appropriate repository to deposit and share research data. SCO provides support for authors preparing and reviewing data management or data sharing plans accompanying grant proposals to funding agencies such as the NSF, NEH, and NIH, including institutional authentication to access the DMPTool for writing data management plans. SCO hosts specialized workshops tailored to a specific focus or topic available by request.

The office supports three open-access repositories that preserve and provide access to the intellectual output of Emory University.

Dataverse at Emory: an open data repository for Emory researchers to publish their data. For more information, please see the Emory Dataverse page.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs): An open-access repository of Emory student theses and dissertations. SCO coordinates the ETD system and offers consultations on copyright issues about theses and dissertations, such as permissions and using previously copyrighted materials. Please contact us for more information.

OpenEmory: An open-access repository of Emory faculty works, journal articles, books, book chapters, conference papers, posters, presentations, and reports. Please contact SCO for assistance submitting work to OpenEmory.

Funding Opportunities

Emory University Libraries provide funds for Emory authors who publish in eligible open-access journals and books or wish to make the data underlying their publications openly available.

Open Access Publishing Fund: Provides funds for Emory authors to publish in eligible open access (OA) journals and books when no alternative funding is available. Faculty and currently enrolled students who meet the eligibility criteria are all eligible to apply for funds.

Research Data Distribution Fund: Provides funds to support Emory University researchers depositing research data in an established repository when no alternative funding is available. Faculty and currently enrolled students who meet the eligibility criteria are all eligible to apply for funds.

The Emory Faculty’s Open Access Policy does not mandate or require that all scholarly publications be made available open-access. Rather, it supports a commitment to the distribution of open-access scholarly publications by allowing the faculty the opportunity to share their publications in our open-access institutional repository, Open Emory. On the other hand, our graduate students and undergraduate honors students are required to submit their theses and dissertations to our open-access Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. This is a requirement of graduation for the participating Emory colleges that utilize this service. 

Data Sources:

Most of the information about Open Access at Emory can be found at these sites:

• http://open.library.emory.edu 
• http://sco.library.emory.edu/open-access-publishing/emory-repositories/emory-oa-policy.html
• http://sco.library.emory.edu/open-access-publishing/oa-funding-support/emory-oa-fund.html
• http://sco.library.emory.edu/open-access-publishing/emory-repositories/index.html