scholarly communication

home Cycle of Success, J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library, Resources and Services Promoting Open Access Research @ MU

Promoting Open Access Research @ MU

By Taira Meadowcroft   Posted in Cycle of Success J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library Resources and Services
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Open Access week is an important week. A week dedicated to highlighting the importance of Open Access and advocating for free, and immediate online access to scholarly research. This year’s theme, “Open in Action,” is all about taking concrete steps to open up research and scholarship and encouraging others to do the same. This was the purpose in creating an open access blog; a way to share research MU faculty choose to publish open access.

Every few weeks, I post about an open access article, right here on our library news page. When typing up the post, I focus on the research itself, the academic accomplishments of the faculty, and the most important, the reasons why they chose to publish in open access. I’ve received several insightul thoughts on why they think open access is important, and to my great delight, all look fantastic as graphics. 😉 Marketing material aside, they are profound thoughts that I hope will strike a chord with other MU faculty, and scholars outside the university, further engaging others and promoting the open access initiative.

 

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October 22nd-October 24th, I presented a poster at Merge&Converge’16, the 2016 Mid-Continent Medical Library Association conference. I wanted to show others that promoting open access, and engaging faculty is easier than we think. Faculty can be open access champions.

 

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home Budget, J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library, Resources and Services Some Taylor & Francis journal prices increasing as much as 25% in 2017

Some Taylor & Francis journal prices increasing as much as 25% in 2017

By E. Diane Johnson   Posted in Budget J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library Resources and Services
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Pricing for 2017 subscriptions is starting to come in, and once again, their prices are increasing. These journals are among a list of 21 subscriptions that will cost the University Libraries $6000 more in 2017 than a year ago. That’s an increase between 15-25%. 

Meanwhile, US inflation for 2017 is projected to be about 2%; nowhere near the average increase of journal subscriptions featured in the list. 

Many disciplines are impacted by these subscription price increases, not just the health sciences:

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home Budget, Zalk Veterinary Medical Library Libraries Budget Update: Journal Cancellations

Libraries Budget Update: Journal Cancellations

By Kate Anderson   Posted in Budget Zalk Veterinary Medical Library
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3 May 2017

The University Libraries are finalizing the previously announced 1.2 million dollar reduction to our collections expenditures for FY17.

The May update to the University Libraries – FY17 Collections Budget page includes an list of titles recommended for cancellation from some of our main journal packages. It also includes a request for feedback on journals in our Chicago Complete package.

If you have any questions about the process or the titles recommended for cancellation, please do not hesitate to contact Kate Anderson

home Resources and Services Open Access in Action: University OA Policies

Open Access in Action: University OA Policies

By Kate Anderson   Posted in Resources and Services
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Open Access

Celebrating Open Access Week: University Open Access Policies

Did you know that several of our peers have Open Access policies (even KU!)? These policies help ensure that faculty make the products of their research freely available to all.

For example, the KU’s Faculty Open Access Policy grants the University the right to deposit scholarly works to KU ScholarWorks, KU’s institutional repository.

In its OA Policy, the University of Arizona notes its land-grant mission and its “dedicat[ion] to making its scholarship available to the people of Arizona and the world to maximize its impact.”

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign states that “Open Access, by providing the widest possible dissemination of research, enhances benefits to the state, region, and world while also raising the visibility and profile of the researcher at the University.”

The University of California’s OA Policy applies not only to faculty but to all “authors who write scholarly article while employed at UC.”

Under these university OA policies, authors retain copyright and can receive waivers in order to opt out of the policy for specific articles. Find out more about faculty-led Open Access policies from the Coalition of Open Access Policy Institutions.

While MU does not currently have an Open Access policy, the University Libraries encourage you to retain your rights; make your work Open Access; and deposit your work to MOspace, MU’s institutional repository. Find out how.

Read more about the benefits of Open Access

home Resources and Services Open Access in Action: Retain Your Rights

Open Access in Action: Retain Your Rights

By Kate Anderson   Posted in Resources and Services
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Open Access

Celebrating Open Access Week: Don’t Sign Away Your Rights!

Traditional publishers’ agreements often transfer copyright from the author to the publisher, giving them the right to reproduce and redistribute your work.

The most important thing you can do is read your copyright transfer agreement. Don’t like what it says? You can amend the agreements to retain the rights you need to make copies of your work and to share it with others.

Examine your publishers’ agreements
What is the publisher requiring of you? Those agreements that require you to transfer all your rights limit what you can do with your own work—that is, you are no longer the copyright holder.

If your publisher agreement reads something like: “the undersigned authors transfer ownership of copyright, including the right to publish and distribute the work by any means, method, or process whether now known or to be development in the future, to the Publisher,” consider amending the agreement.

Agreements that let you retain control of your work often have phrases like: “I grant the journal a non-exclusive license to publish my work”; “I understand that no rights are transferred to the Journal”; or “I understand that a Creative Commons license will be applied to my work.”

Modify your agreements when needed
Publishing agreements are negotiable. Know your rights and consider using the SPARC author addendum to modify your agreement.

Deposit your work in MOspace
If you’ve retained the right to post to an online archive, submit your work to the MOspace Institutional Repository. An institutional repository, like MOspace, is one of the best ways to disseminate and preserve your work.  As an Open Access tool, MOspace ensures that current and future generations of scholars benefit by finding your work.

More information on retaining your rights.

home Budget, J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library $101,000 cut from Health Sciences Library journal subscriptions in 2017

$101,000 cut from Health Sciences Library journal subscriptions in 2017

By E. Diane Johnson   Posted in Budget J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library
Posted on

The Health Sciences Library journal list has been updated to show the latest cancellation decisions. A total of $101,116 was cut from these subscriptions under the control of the Health Sciences Library – a cut of about 20%.

As previously announced,  book purchasing will also be drastically curtailed this year as a further cost saving measure.

Subject and title lists of journals being cancelled across all the campus libraries  have also been posted and will be updated as needed throughout the fall semester.

Contract negotiations are underway with Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, Sage and Oxford, and we will share information on the future of those journal packages as it becomes available.

Read more about the budget challenges facing the Health Sciences Library 

 

home Resources and Services Digital preservation: How much is it going to cost, and who can I work with?

Digital preservation: How much is it going to cost, and who can I work with?

By Edward McCain   Posted in Resources and Services
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The expense of digital preservation for the news producer will vary depending on how much of the effort is managed in-house. By collaborating with those who already have the infrastructure, the cost to news agencies could be very little indeed.

Read more at the Reynolds Journalism Institute blog: Digital preservation: How much is it going to cost, and who can I work with?

home J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library, Resources and Services Drs. Lin, McElroy, and Nagel: Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals and Oil and Natural Gas Operations (Open Access)

Drs. Lin, McElroy, and Nagel: Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals and Oil and Natural Gas Operations (Open Access)

By Taira Meadowcroft   Posted in J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library Resources and Services
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This week’s Open Access blog post features, not one, not two, but three University of Missouri Faculty:

  • Dr. Chung-Ho Lin, PhD., is an Assistant Research Professor in the School of Natural Resources. Dr. Lin’s primary research involves the use of plants and genetics modified microbes for applications in the area of phytoremediation and bioremediation in agroforestry. Click here to learn more.
  • Dr. Jane McElroy, PhD., in an Associate Professor of Family and Community Medicine in the School of Medicine. Dr. McElroy’s research interests include cancer and chronic disease, environmental exposures with metals, and geographical information systems. Click here to learn more about Dr. McElroy.
  • Dr. Suan Nagel, PhD., is an Associate Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Women’s Health in the School of Medicine. Dr. Nagel’s clincal and research interests include endocrine disruption, fetal origins of adult disease, and epigenetics, to name a few. To learn more about Dr. Nagel, click here.

This research team published in the open access journal Environmental Health Perspectives back in March. Environmental Health Perspectives is “a monthly peer-reviewed journal of research and news published with support from the National Insititure of Environmental Health, National Institutes of Health, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.”

Their article, Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals and Oil and Natural Gas Operations: Potential Environmental Contamination and Recommendations to Assess Complex Environmental Mixtures, is a commentary on hydraulic fracking technologies and the potiential for environmental release of oil and gas chemicals and potential endocine-related health effects from exposure to the hazardous chemcials. They describe a need for an endocrine componement to health asssessments conducted in regards to hydraulic fracking.

home J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library, Resources and Services, Zalk Veterinary Medical Library Dr. Franz: Infection pattern and transmission potential of chikungunya virus (Open Access)

Dr. Franz: Infection pattern and transmission potential of chikungunya virus (Open Access)

By Taira Meadowcroft   Posted in J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library Resources and Services Zalk Veterinary Medical Library
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Dr. Alexander Franz, Ph.D. is an assistant professor in the department of Veterinary Pathology at the College of Veterinary Medicine. His research focuses on mosquito-borne arboviruses and their interaction with the mosquito. Recently, his team became involved in studying Zika virus, i.e. developing an animal model, in collaboration with Dr. Jeff Adamovicz (Dept. of Veterinary Pathobiology, MU), and Dr. Carl Gelhaus, (MRI-Global, Kansas City); in collaboration with Dr. R. Michael Roberts (Life Sciences Center, MU), [they] are taking part in the investigation of the mechanism allowing Zika virus to infect human placenta-derived cells. If you would like to learn more about Dr. Franz, click here,

Dr. Franz, along with Dr. Shengzhand Dong and their research team, published in Scientific Reports, an online open access scientific mega journal published by the Nature Publishing Group.. In August, a blog post on the Scholarly Kitchen, mentioned that the journal is likely to become the biggest one in the world, overtaking the open access journal, PLOS ONE. Their article, Infection pattern and transmission potential of chikungunya virus in two New World laboratory-adapted Aedes aegyptistrains, discusses the mosquite-borne Chikungunya virus and its infection pattern.

 

Why did you choose to publish in an Open Access journal?

“We were interested in reaching a broad audience also in countries/institutions that may not be able to afford high-price journal subscriptions and therefore rely on open access articles to get informed about scientific developments/discoveries. This is especially useful when working on things like tropical disease agents, which often are a problem in countries that do not have a rich science infrastructure.”

Would you publish in an Open Access journal again?  If so, why?

“Yes, I would. I like the concept of open access even though it means that we (as authors) have to pay for the publication. But ususally, it also means that we (as authors) retain the copy rights of our work.”

home Budget, J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library, Resources and Services Additional details about $150,000 Health Sciences Library collections cut

Additional details about $150,000 Health Sciences Library collections cut

By E. Diane Johnson   Posted in Budget J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library Resources and Services
Posted on

You probably have already heard about the cut to the MU Libraries Collections planned for the coming year .  Here’s what we know as of now about what it will mean for the Health Sciences Library:

Our collections allocation will be reduced about $150,000 compared to last year – a 20% reduction.

Meeting this target will require us to:

  • Drastically reduce our book spending to only $21,000 in new purchases in FY2017.
  • Cancel $100,000 in Health Sciences Library journal subscriptions.  These cuts will be made based on a combination of factors, including:
    • Usage and cost per use.
    • Journals with subscription prices which far outstrip normal inflation are getting special scrutiny. Some examples
    • To the extent possible, we will try to maintain subscriptions to the journals you publish in, cite, or have identified as core to your work.
  • This $100,000 cut must be taken from the $577,000 in subscriptions under the direct financial control of the Health Sciences Library.
  • These cuts are in addition to reductions to University Libraries centrally-administered journal subscription packages from Elsevier, Wiley, Sage, Oxford and Springer.  Any cuts to journals in those packages will be in addition to, not in the place of the $100,00 journal cut facing the Health Sciences Library. 

 

A list of all journal subscriptions under review, with prices and publishers listed, is now live on the Health Sciences Library web site, along with additional details about the budget challenges facing our library. The list will be a continually updated with cancellation information until we reach our budget reduction goal.

 

Please let us know if you have questions and concerns.