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Open Access Publishing

Open Access Funding from Pepperdine University Libraries

Pepperdine University Libraries have funds to help cover the expenses of article and book processing charges and other open access publishing expenses.
Who is eligible?

Pepperdine faculty, staff and current students. Student authors must collaborate with a Pepperdine professor who can serve either as the primary author (first author listed) or senior author (last author listed).

What is the maximum amount the library can provide?

Journal article funding is capped at $3,000 for a single article and $3,000 is the maximum funding for a book. A single author can receive a maximum of $3,000 over a fiscal year.

How are funds disbursed?

Articles, chapters and books must be accepted for publication before a funding application can be submitted. If your application for Library funding has been approved, please contact Marc.Vinyard@pepperderdine.edu with the invoice and the Library will pay the publisher directly.

Do authors have to exhaust other funds?

Yes, if an author receives a grant that provides funding for open access processing charges, they are expected to use those funds before applying for library funding. If the grant funds aren't sufficient to cover the open access expenses, authors can apply for a library grant to cover the remaining charges. Authors are also expected to request school and departmental funds before submitting an application to the library. In many cases, authors must secure funding from a variety of sources and the Pepperdine Library is a willing partner in this process.

Timeline:

Funds are granted on a first-come, first-serve basis. If the library's open access funds have been exhausted during a fiscal year, the fund will be suspended until the next fiscal year.

Conditions for funding:
  • The primary author must be affiliated with Pepperdine
  • Articles must meet the following conditions:
    • Appear in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
    • Included in Scopus Journal Rankings or Scimago journal rankings
    • Published in a gold open access journal. Hybrid journals are *not* eligible because the publishers are involved in "double-dipping" by charging both article processing charges and subscription fees. Articles in hybrid journals are normally hidden behind paywalls unless authors pay the article processing charge.
    • Articles must appear in gold open access journals that make all articles freely available on their website. The library is not funding hybrid open access articles. With hybrid open access, authors aren't required to pay fees for their articles to be published and they are only charged a fee if they want their article to be open access. Authors who publish in subscription journals can make their articles open access free of charge by adding their article to the Libraries Digital Commons platform after an embargo period.
  • Books must meet the following criteria:
  • Publications must be in the English language because our goal is to fund publishing that will reach the highest number of readers
Additional considerations for funding:
  • Authors who support green open access initiatives by adding their accepted manuscripts to the library's Digital Commons platform will be given priority for funding. Authors who receive library open access funding are encouraged to add past and future articles to the Library's Digital Commons platform that are eligible for green open access. Our goal is support authors who have a commitment to open access publishing.
  • Higher ranked journals will received priority over lower ranked publications. Ideally, journals should be ranked in the first or second quartiles in the Scopus Journal Rankings or Scimago journal rankings for their subject areas.
Who decides if funds are approved?
  • The Pepperdine Libraries open access steering committee will carefully consider every applications. Funding decisions are determined on the basis of the publishing venue and the author's willingness to add content to the Library's Digital Commons platform rather than the content of the work.
How soon will I find out if I receive library funding?
  • The open access steering committee will make every effort to make a decision within 10 business days after receiving an author's application.
Open Access Support Application

Transformative Agreements/Read and Publish Agreements

As a member of the Statewide California Electronic Library Consortium (SCELC), Pepperdine Libraries is part of several read-and-publish agreements allowing Pepperdine-affiliated authors to publish articles open access at no cost. As part of their agreement, the publishers listed below will cover the article processing charges on research articles accepted for publication in their journals. For articles written by more than one person, the author listed as the corresponding author must be from Pepperdine to be eligible for the article processing charge waiver.

American Chemical Society (valid until December 31, 2025)

  • Any Pepperdine corresponding authors who wish to publish open access in all 79 subscription-based and fully open access American Chemical Society journals can do so through a discounted article processing charge of $3,000. Those who do not have research funds to pay the discounted article processing charge can request full funding from SCELC.

    If an author has grant funding for open access publishing, authors receive a discounted $3,000 open access article processing charge. If the author does not have grant funding for the article processing charge, the author can still choose to publish open access. When they are asked if they have research funds to pay for the article processing charge, they should select “seek funding” which will route the request to the SCELC subscription pool.

Cambridge University Press (valid until December 31, 2024)

  • All Pepperdine corresponding authors are offered open access publishing at no charge. During the submission process, their institutional affiliation and email are used to automatically associate with the SCELC agreement and, upon acceptance, are offered open access publishing. Original research articles are defined as research articles, review articles, rapid communications, brief reports, and case reports. Authors can use Cambridge’s waivers and discounts page to confirm their eligibility ahead of time and view a list of the 387 journals covered by the agreement. Authors who published on or after January 1, 2021 may order open access retroactively within the same year of publication.

Springer (valid until December 31, 2024)

  • Any Pepperdine corresponding authors who wishes to publish open access in any of the 2,068 hybrid journals contained within Springer, Palgrave, society-owned academic journals on Nature.com, or Adis collections is eligible as long as their original paper, review paper, brief communication, or continuing education publication is accepted. Two caveats:

    Nature-branded or Scientific American content is excluded as are the 279 fully open access journals in the Springer portfolio.

    This agreement will provide free open access publication for up to 550 articles in 2023 across participating SCELC institutions (including Pepperdine University), which is roughly 101% of the average number of qualifying articles that participating institutions’ corresponding authors published in those journals over the past three years. It is possible that the SCELC consortium will collectively exceed this cap, but a historical analysis of author open access opt-out rates and other factors makes this unlikely. It is hoped that future agreements will be able to include a higher number of articles and journals.

The Company of Biologists, Ltd. (valid until December 31, 2026)

Open access funding scenarios

Journal Funding Scenario:

Professor X published an article in the open access journal PLOS Biology.  Here are the scholarly metrics for this journal:

  • According to SCIMago's Journal Rankings, PLOS Biology is ranked 91th in the subject of "Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology" which places it in the first quartile of journals for this subject field.
  • Scopus' journal rankings reveal that the Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP) was 2.005 in 2020. SNIP is journal metric that adjusts for subject categories and allows for direct comparisons of journals from different subject fields. If the Library's open access steering committee members receive requests for funding from several professors, the SNIP allows them to make objective evaluations of journal quality.

     The article processing fee for PLOS Biology is $5,300 per article. Professor X used $3,000 from a research grant and the Seaver Natural Sciences Division contributed another $1,000 in funding to help fund the article processing charges. After paying the $5,300 article processing fee, Professor X still needs $1,300 in funding. After the Library's open access steering committee approves their request for $1,300, they provide the Library with an invoice for the open access charges.

Book Funding Scenario:

Professor Y published an open access from Luminos (University of California Press). University of California Press is included in the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB).

     The book processing fee for University of California Press is $7,500. They received $3,000 in funding from the Humanities Division and $1,500 from a Seaver Dean's Research Grant. Professor Y still needs $3,000 in funding for the open access charges. The Library's Open Access Steering Committee approves their funding application and awards them $3,000 in funding. Professor Y sends the Library an invoice for the open access charges.

Research on OA funding from academic libraries

Hudson Vitale, Cynthia, and Judy Ruttenberg. Investments in Open: Association of Research Libraries US University Member Expenditures on Services, Collections, Staff, and Infrastructure in Support of Open Scholarship. Washington, DC: Association of Research Libraries, November 2022. https://doi.org/10.29242/report.investmentsinopen2022.