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Open Access & Scholarly Publishing

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For Authors

Open Access Funds Available

open access logo

The University Libraries, in collaboration with the Provost, has established a fund to finance payment of article processing fees for Boston College authors who publish in peer-reviewed, fully open access journals.

Learn more about the policies of the fund. Submit an application for funding.

The Copyright Holder Controls the Work

Traditionally, publishers’ contracts restricted an author's use of published work in teaching and research. Contracts often prohibited placing the published work

  • on course websites
  • in a course-pack
  • in scholarly presentations
  • on the author’s personal web page
  • and in such scholarly e-print repositories as BC's own eScholarship@BC.

Many publishers now anticipate an author's legitimate need to distribute and repurpose his work and no longer require exclusive rights to publication. Some publishers balance their interest in recouping publishing costs with the author’s desire to disseminate their ideas broadly, placing a short-term embargo on the open access archiving of the work.

Transferring copyright doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Publishers require only the author’s permission to publish an article, not a wholesale transfer of copyright. To make retention of rights easier, use the Scholar's Copyright Addendum Engine to generate a cusomized addendum to your publisher's contract, reserving the rights you need.

Author Rights Information

Assessing Journal Quality

When planning to publish in an academic journal or respond to a request to edit a journal, quality counts. Many factors influence the decision, whether the journal is a traditional one or an open access journal. The Assessing Journal Quality guide has some tips for factors to consider.

SHERPA/RoMEO

  • Use the Sherpa/RoMEO website to find a journal or publisher's standard policy on retention of copyright by authors.
  • The entry for each publisher lists conditions or restrictions imposed by the publisher on authors' rights to deposit their articles in open access repositories.