Open Access

Open Access logoMaking an article available on Open Access means that it can be freely accessed by anyone in the world using an internet connection. Providing Open Access to your work is a way of making publicly funded research available to the public.

Benefits of Open Access

  • Increase the visibility of your work
  • Increase the research profile of the University, your School or Research Centre
  • Provide free access to research for developing countries, socio-economically disadvantaged groups and the general public.

Funding mandates

The NHMRC and ARC have both mandated that research resulting from NHMRC or ARC funding is to be made available on Open Access via the institutional repository, for SCU that is Research Portal. See the Open Access Mandates page for more information.

This will often require an addendum to your Author/Publisher agreement. The NHMRC has recommended the following wording to be added to the contract you sign with your publisher;

'The Author has the right to archive their version of the article (Word document) after peer-review, with revisions having been made, on their institutional website and their personal website, provided in all cases a link to the journal article on the Publisher web-site is included.'

Different Open Access models

Green

  • The author first publishes their work in a journal of their choice, and then deposits, or 'self-archives', a version of the work in either an institutional or subject repository, making it freely available.
  • The version which can be deposited is specified by the publisher.

Gold

  • The author publishes in an Open Access Journal that allows immediate Open Access to the article.
  • Usually involves an article processing fee e.g. PLoS ONE.
  • A link from the metadata in Southern Cross Research Portal to the Open Access article satisfies the ARC and NHMRC mandates.

Hybrid

  • The author pays a publisher to make their article available on Open Access
  • Be aware that this is often unnecessary as the ARC and NHMRC mandates only require the Post Print, or Accepted Manuscript, to be made available within 12 months of publication.

Article Processing Charges (APCs)

  • APCs are charged by Open Access publishers to cover the costs of publishing instead of raising revenue from subscriptions
  • The APC will vary usually depending on the impact factor of the journal.

Embargoes

  • Some commercial publishers apply an embargo to the Accepted Manuscript
  • This will usually be outlined in your author agreement
  • The Accepted Manuscript can be added to Southern Cross Research Portal and Profiles where the system will apply an embargo period as per the publisher's requirement
  • We are happy to help you interpret your publisher agreement. Email ResearchPortal@scu.edu.au if you have an enquiry.

Which version to submit

To comply with the ARC and NHMRC mandates the Accepted Manuscript must be submitted to ePublications@SCU and made available on Open Access within 12 months of publishing. Different publishers apply different copyright restrictions on the their Accepted Manuscripts, ePublications staff will check copyright for you and make your Accepted Manuscript available wherever possible. Just email your Accepted Manuscript to ResearchPortal@scu.edu.au.

The Post Print, or Accepted Manuscript, is the final version of your manuscript before publisher markup and after any changes by reviewers. SHERPA/RoMEO provide a list of Publishers allowing the deposition of their published version/PDF in Institutional Repositories.

Both mandates state that if you are unable to supply an Open Access version of your paper then the metadata i.e. the citation details, must at least must be included in the Institutional Repository.

The Library team who work on the Southern Cross Research Portal receive your publications details from your research publications submissions to the Office of Research. It would be useful to include the Accepted Manuscript of your publications at this point. The Team will then check any copyright requirements and post the article on your behalf.

Open Access resources on the web

  • DOAJ - Directory of Open Access Journals
  • DOAB - Directory of Open Access Books
  • SHERPA/RoMEO - for publisher copyright policies and self archiving rules, search by Journal Title