scholarly journals Publishing with Open Journal Systems (OJS): the engaged university and library support at the University of Stavanger

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mina Farmanbar ◽  
Per Kolstrup
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Management System ◽  
Technical Skills ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Journal Publishing ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
Design Skills ◽  
The University ◽  
Open Journal Systems

Increasing the role of libraries in academic journal publishing activities and journal hosting has become an important subject in the library world in the past few years. The purpose of this study is to present the role of the libraries at University of Stavanger (UiS) in the context of library-as-publisher. Within this category, open access (OA) journal publishing has been a popular service offered by libraries, rapidly attracting researchers' attention. The University Libraries at University of Stavanger (UiS) have a long history of promoting and supporting open access initiatives. The Libraries have established and continue to build, host and maintain an operative open access institutional repository (UiS Brage) for scientific works in full text. From 2018, UiS libraries started using a journal management system to facilitate the open access scholarly publishing and therefore support transferring and updating of established the existing journals and the lunching of new ones. The Open Journal Systems (OJS) from Public Knowledge Project (PKP) is used which is the most common journal management system being discussed frequently in literature. Currently, the UiS Libraries repository host four active open access journals, with some others under development. All these journals reside within the same OJS implementation with the same design and layout on top, however, at the individual journal level there are also options for some customization.  UiS libraries initially support all the steps of the journal creation and development process but train the editors and the subsequent users to engage in some part of the process. The library IT-Engineer and Information Technology Department (IT) manage OJS server, maintain the OJS database and software, and performs the layout and design customization and development and initial technical configuration for the new journals. From the viewpoint of IT, there is a need for several technical skills such as web design skills to customize the style sheets and web layout, graphic design skills to produce banners, logos and cover pages whereas the editorial workflow process may require skills on copy-editing and proofreading of articles. OJS is a template-based platform but when it comes to front-end design, it has its limitation. There are certain limitations which make it difficult to get to the details of the article. For instance, when an article comes with a long abstract or number of references, the web-page becomes unfriendly. Another challenge is when PKP launches a new OJS update. Some features cannot be migrated, and you may lose them. Furthermore, users may find it hard to adapt to the new version. The biggest challenge to the OJS is the learning curve. There are some faculty members who have had some frustrations with the software. While it is a free and open source platform, the time, technical skills and programming abilities are still associated with the costs. In this poster we provide you with the challenges and lessons learned so far by the libraries at Stavanger University.

First steps for a library publisher

2015 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 76-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Somaly Kim Wu ◽  
Heather McCullough
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Electronic Publishing ◽  
Academic Library ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Journal Publishing ◽  
Digital Scholarship ◽  
Publishing Services ◽  
Communication Policies ◽  
The University

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to presents the very recent development of e-journal publishing services at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Charlotte. In 2011, the J. Murrey Atkins Library at UNC Charlotte created a new unit in the library, the Digital Scholarship Lab (DSL), which partners with faculty and graduate students in the use of digital and networked research tools to create, disseminate and store new knowledge. E-journal publishing and hosting are among the suite of services offered by the DSL, and we currently publish three journals (https://journals.uncc.edu/). Design/methodology/approach – This report provides an overview of the context of our library’s decision to begin publishing journals, including a discussion of our university’s becoming more research-intensive, our university system mandating increased efficiencies and sharing research with the state citizens, and the library’s own goals of raising awareness of and supporting open access. Also outlined are the technical and procedural choices made, important activities undertaken to develop, define and publicize the new services, campus response to the service and next steps. Findings – This report provides detailed accounting of how a large academic library implemented an electronic publishing service to support open access scholarship. Important activities such as marketing communication, policies development and technical/procedural activities are defined and results described. The report provides observation and lessons learned for academic libraries in development and support of electronic journals. Originality/value – Library as the publisher is a new concept. This report will be of interest to many libraries who are considering offering publishing services and to libraries that currently offer publishing services.

scholarly journals Keynote Address for Western Journal Day

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jerry P. White ◽  
Susan Wingert
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Keynote Address ◽  
Western Journal ◽  
Indigenous Policy ◽  
Open Access Journals

Today, I want to look at three interconnected things. The first is the importance of open access and what it really means. The second is the role of Scholarship@Western in supporting our open access journals from the perspective of the International Indigenous Policy Journal (IIPJ). Lastly, we want to talk about some of the actions that we have taken to enhance our journal’s readership and rankings.

scholarly journals Report on open access publishing at the College of Education, Health and Human Development, University of Canterbury, New Zealand

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arindam Basu
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Open Access ◽  
Open Access Publishing ◽  
Audience Participation ◽  
Research Committee ◽  
Creative Commons ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
Questions And Answers ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The University

Open access publications are those where following the publication itself, the publishers allow anyone to access the article or publication to read, or download without any restriction. It is believed that publishing in open access journals can increase the visibility of the publication, although uncertainties prevail. In a bid to improve the PBRF ratings, the College research committee in its monthly meeting agreed to organise an Open Access Seminar in the college. The seminar was organised on 4th of June, 2015, Thursday. Four speakers were identified. They were: Peter Lund and Anton Angelo from the University of Canterbury Central Library and Researcn Unit, Peter Binfield from PeerJ, and Viriginia Barbour from Australian Open Access Support Group. The topics of the seminar included a brief introduction to open access publishing and the state of the scenario in NZ and Australia and exploration of the issues around green and gold open access, and future directions as to what can be done to increase participation in open access. The seminar was also designed to be an open to all, and free flowing discussion. This seminar followed a format of webinar and on the spot presentations, questions and answers. A web based page was set up using the openly accessible Adobe Connect "room" where participants could connect even if they were not able to attend in person. Dr Binfield and Barbour were overseas speakers and they connected using the webinar (Adobe Connect). Mr Lund and Angelo were local speakers and they came to the meeting hall directly and spoke. A resource website was set up and the event was recorded for later viewing. The event was publicised across the university and through online channels. About 30 individuals attended the meeting in person, and ten participants joined online. Mr Lund introduced the concept of open access at the University of Canterbury, and introduced the concepts of gold and green open access; Mr Angelo introduced the concepts of creative commons, and Drs Binfield and Barbour discussed models of open access and the situation in Australia. The floor was open for questions, and clarifications and discussions from the audience participation. Key takeaway lessons from the seminar included: at the University of Canterbury, scholars are active in publishing in Open Access channels; green open access is popular in Australia and in New Zealand; newer channels and novel publishing models uitlising the Open Access formats are emerging and becoming popular; while some reservations about quality in open access exist, quality of peer review in OA journals were at par.

scholarly journals Changing the publishing landscape towards openness – supporting hybrid Open Access at the University of Bergen

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingrid Cutler ◽  
Tormod Strømme ◽  
Irene Eikefjord
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Hybrid Model ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Open Access Publishing ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Quality Issue ◽  
Research Fields ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
The University ◽  
Level 2

See video of the presentation.In 2013 The University of Bergen established a publication fund to cover the costs for publishing Open Access. The fund covers Article Processing Charges (APC) in both Open Access journals and hybrid Open Access in subscription journals. The publication fund at The University of Bergen is one of few in Norway that includes support for hybrid Open Access. The hybrid model is controversial because the publisher receives income twice for the same article, first through APC and then through subscriptions.The arguments for including hybrid were: (1) there are more journals to choose from, hence giving more researchers the opportunity and initiative to publish Open Access. (2) the quality issue of Open Access journals. The University believed that by including hybrid more articles would be published Open Access in renowned journals. This because a larger percentage of hybrid journals are registered on level 2 in the Norwegian System for defining quality of publication channels.The fund has been a success in so far that it has led to an increase in Open Access articles in high quality journals, also within research fields that traditionally do not publish Open Access. The fund has granted applications for almost 9 million NOK. Of a total of 437 granted applications, 278 (64 %) are articles in hybrid journals. 103 articles (24 %) have been published on level 2; 11 in Open Access-journals and 92 hybrid.When it comes to research field, the results show that about 90 % of granted applications come from researchers within medicine, psychology and the natural sciences, including many fields that already have a tradition for publishing their research Open Access. The fund has only led to a slight increase in Open Access publishing with APC within the humanities, social sciences and law.Researchers are happy with hybrid publishing because they are able to continue publishing in the same journals as before. It is also the case that support of hybrid publishing results in more Open Access articles in high quality journals according to the Norwegian system. Yet, support for hybrid publishing has so far not altered which research fields that publish Open Access, although there has been an increase of Open Access publications within all faculties.Our presentation will form a basis for discussing a number of questions pertaining to the hybrid model: What have the academic and economic consequences of the hybrid model been? Do all researchers at the University have the same opportunity to publish their research Open Access? Has support of hybrid lead to more Open Access in renowned publication channels?The University has appointed a group to evaluate the publication fund and recommend if and how it shall continue. Will the fund continue to support hybrid after the trial period ends in 2015?

scholarly journals Towards a sustainable Open Access monograph publishing workflow for academic institutions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonia Schrader ◽  
Alexander Grossmann ◽  
Michael Reiche
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Book Publishing ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Journal Articles ◽  
Research Project ◽  
University Presses ◽  
The University ◽  
Publication Workflow ◽  
Publishing Workflow

Across the world, there is a growing interest in Open Access (OA) publishing. Therefore, OA publishing has become a trend and is of key importance to the scientific community. However, observing the publication landscape in Germany leads to a striking finding of very different approaches. In particular, OA book publishing is still in relatively early stages, leading to OA books being much less frequently published than OA journal articles. However, although well-established publishers offer the publication of OA books, only certain researchers can actually publish, because of high Book Processing Charges (BPCs). In contrast to such publishers, university presses publish books as OA without any or at significantly lower charges; however, university presses are often inadequately staffed and do not have the technical know-how of the state-of-the-art publishing of OA books possessed by well-established publishers. For these reasons, our research project aims to develop an ideal and transferable publication workflow for OA books that is both cost-effective and personnel-efficient as well as media-neutral to enable universities to publish their publications as OA. To this end, a one-day meeting with stakeholders of the publication landscape was held in June 2018 at the University of Applied Science in Leipzig, Germany. During the meeting, the stakeholders were asked to present their views on the current situation and also the lessons learned and the shortcomings of the existing approaches. As a result, the observation was confirmed that the publication landscape is very heterogeneous and that there are no standardised interfaces and no harmonised practices for publishing OA books. Furthermore, in a discussion with the stakeholders during the second part of the meeting, further various issues of OA book publishing were revealed that have to be considered. Additionally, the various challenges and wishes of the stakeholders could be classified into five topic areas. These findings illustrate that the primary task of the research project has to be the analysis of the existing publishing workflows and abstracting generally valid processes that are needed to publish OA books. Additionally, the further issues of OA book publishing, mentioned by the stakeholders, have to be addressed during the development. The five topic areas will help reduce the complexity of this project.

scholarly journals Library Publishing Programs at Capacity: Addressing Issues of Sustainability and Scalability

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johanna Meetz ◽  
Jason Boczar
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Business Plan ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Institutional Repository ◽  
Staff Time ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
Publishing Program

This article discusses the changes to overall goals, direction, and services that were made to two library publishing programs at University A and University B when they were no longer able to grow their programs due to an inability to hire additional staff and COVID-19-instigated staff reassignments. Description of Programs University A's publishing program grew out of its institutional repository, and, at its peak, published 7 open access journals. In addition, University A's Libraries founded a University Press in 2016, which has published 6 books as of 2021. University B's publishing program began publishing open access journals in 2008, and it has grown to include over 20 journals. Lessons Learned Both University A and University B's publishing programs have faced scalability and sustainability issues, which were further exacerbated by COVID-19. The focus of our library publishing programs, as well as many others, has been on continual growth, which is not sustainable without the ability to hire additional staff or allocate staff time differently. We argue that standardizing services as well as creating a business plan can help ensure publishing programs are sustainable and scalable. Next Steps We hope to begin a conversation among library publishers about acknowledging limits and creating achievable definitions of success outside of continual growth.

scholarly journals The Scholarly Communications Needs of Faculty: An Evidence-Based Foundation for the Development of Library Services

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Dawson
Keyword(s):  
Open Access ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Open Access Publishing ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
University Library ◽  
Open Access Journals ◽  
Scholarly Communications ◽  
Communications Services ◽  
Article Processing Charges ◽  
The University

Abstract Objectives – This exploratory research seeks to broadly understand the publishing behaviours and attitudes of faculty, across all disciplines, at the University of Saskatchewan in response to the growing significance of open access publishing and archiving. The objective for seeking this understanding is to discover the current and emerging needs of researchers in order to determine if scholarly communications services are in demand here and, if so, to provide an evidence-based foundation for the potential future development of such a program of services at the University Library, University of Saskatchewan. Methods – All faculty members at the University of Saskatchewan were sent personalized email invitations to participate in a short online survey during the month of November 2012. The survey was composed of four parts: Current Research and Publishing Activities/Behaviours; Open Access Behaviours, Awareness, and Attitudes; Needs Assessment; and Demographics. Descriptive and inferential statistics were calculated. Results – The survey elicited 291 complete responses – a 21.9% response rate. Results suggest that faculty already have a high level of support for the open access movement, and considerable awareness of it. However, there remains a lack of knowledge regarding their rights as authors, a low familiarity with tools available to support them in their scholarly communications activities, and substantial resistance to paying the article processing charges of some open access journals. Survey respondents also provided a considerable number of comments – perhaps an indication of their engagement with these issues and desire for a forum in which to discuss them. It is reasonable to speculate that those who chose not to respond to this survey likely have less interest in, and support of, open access. Hence, the scholarly communications needs of this larger group of non-respondents are conceivably even greater. Conclusion – Faculty at the University of Saskatchewan are in considerable need of scholarly communications services. Areas of most need include: advice and guidance on authors’ rights issues such as retention of copyright; more education and support with resources such as subject repositories; and additional assistance with article processing charges. The University Library could play a valuable role in increasing the research productivity and impact of faculty by aiding them in these areas.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document