University of Colorado Colorado Springs
AC-11: Open Access to Research

There is not an official policy for faculty and staff, only graduate students.

The UCCS Kraemer Family Library serves as the repository for scholarly work produced by students, faculty, and staff. All graduate theses and dissertations, for example, must be turned in to the library upon completion and are included in the library's collections. The library's policy toward access in its Digital Collections is detailed as follows:

The intent of the Digital Collections is to create a platform that will make available the scholarly and creative works produced by the University of Colorado Colorado Springs. Materials of enduring value will be freely accessible to researchers and students on the campus and around the world. Content may be discovered through Internet search engines and linked to using persistent URLs ("handles")

The Digital Collections complements established methods of scholarly communication by providing open access and accommodating formats and supplemental materials not supported by traditional publishing methods.

Dissertations and Theses from the University of Colorado
Colorado Springs
This collection contains born-digital graduate student work. The Kraemer Family Library provides open access to full text of all UCCS Dissertations submitted after 2010 and Theses submitted Fall 2015 and later. Dissertations and theses are organized by college and discipline.

Authors may restrict access to the UCCS campus community or place an embargo on publication of their dissertation for a maximum of two years. This is indicated within the repository.

Dissertations and theses submitted prior to Fall 2015 can be found in print in the Kraemer Family Library catalog.

Collection Policy
The mission of the UCCS Digital Collections, a service of the Kraemer Family Library, is to preserve and provide persistent and reliable access to the research output, scholarship, and creative works of faculty, academic staff, students, and administration of the University of Colorado Colorado Springs (UCCS)

Content Policy
The intent of the Digital Collections is to create a platform that will make available the scholarly and creative works produced by the University of Colorado Colorado Springs. Materials of enduring value will be freely accessible to researchers and students on the campus and around the world. Content may be discovered through Internet search engines and linked to using persistent URLs ("handles")

The Digital Collections complements established methods of scholarly communication by providing open access and accommodating formats and supplemental materials not supported by traditional publishing methods.

Collection Development/Materials Selection
Items will be selected for inclusion by the working group of the community based on their selection criteria which may include the following:

Authorship
Rights
Content
Format
Significance in the field
Intellectual Property and Copyright
The content creator retains copyright of materials deposited in the repository and allows the Digital Collections non-exclusive distribution and preservation rights for the work.

Inclusion of previously published works in the repository is dependent on the warranty of the creator/copyright holder that publishing agreements allow for open access publication of the work.

Intellectual Property information is included in the metadata for each digital object. Copyright notification may be included within documents or other files.

Restrictions on access will be evaluated on an individual basis:

Dissertations may be embargoed or access restricted to the UCCS community for a maximum of two years.
Content may be removed from the Digital Collections for the following causes:

The community/working group determines it should be removed.
Violation of copyright laws.
Publisher agreements that disallow open access through the digital repository.
Metadata
Description of the digital object will aid users in locating resources. Metadata standards for the UCCS collection are based on the Dublin Core metadata schema and are described in detail in the Kraemer Family Library University of Colorado Colorado Springs Minimum Metadata Standard

Metadata will be provided by the creator/submitting party.

Each item in the Digital Collections will have the following metadata elements:

Creator (if applicable, multiple Creators will be listed as Contributors)
Date
Description
Format
Rights (copyright ownership and access conditions)
Type (identification of format and file type)
Supported File Types
PDF - PDF/A is preferred for preservation
JPEG - JPEG2000 is preferred for preservation
Other file types may but uploaded to the repository but their use will be dependent on the computer/device accessing them having the appropriate software to read the file. Persistent access to proprietary and non-supported file types cannot be guaranteed.

Deposit Agreement
Staff of the Kraemer Family Library will deposit items on behalf of contributors. Contributors will sign a deposit agreement at the time the item(s) and metadata are submitted to the Digital Collections.