Publishing Opportunities

What is open access publishing?

Open access is defined as "the free, immediate, availability on the public Internet of those works which scholars give to the world without expectation of payment – permitting any user to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search or link to the full text of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software or use them for any other lawful purpose." --SPARC

Why publish open access content?

Being open access not only means greater access for the public to read your work, but then also the likelihood of rapid, wide consumption. Having the full text be searchable by machines means an open access article's contents--not just the title--can be discovered by a search engine's algorithm, i.e. Googleable. Wide, rapid consumption leads to the possibility for greater impact.

How does it work?

Instead of collecting fees from the readers after publication, publishers instead require a fee from the submitters (see the section below on
Article Processing Charges), usually the authors of the article, book, or chapter. Unfortunately, this model has also led to a rise in predatory publishers--publishers that pose as reputable open access publishers, but instead churn out any and all submissions, regardless of quality, with little to no review process. The articles then generally are lost within the flood and do not often receive citations following publication. See the section on Predatory Publishers to learn more.

How do I find reputable open access publishers?

With the rise of predatory publishing, it is becoming increasingly important to ensure an open access publisher is trustworthy. Use the links below for information on locating directories of recognized and vetted open access publishers.

In response to the open access, the number of open access journals has been increasing rapidly. The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), an independent index of reputable open access journals, launched in 2003 with only 300 journals indexed and currently lists over 17,000. As publishers transition to offering hybrid or full open access publishing, many are exploring new income models to support open access publishing. One common income model publishers use to support open access is administering article processing charges, also known as article publication charges or article processing fees.  

Article processing charges (APCs) are often subsidized by research grants, foundations, internal departmental funds, or an institutional open access fund. A survey was distributed to faculty at Creighton University in March 2022 to determine what barrier ACPs are to the campus scholars. Data from this survey was shared to initiate a discussion on whether or not there is a need for an open access fund. A summary of the results is available below, for more details see the story published in the University Libraries newsletter.