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Open Access FAQ

Information and resources addressing frequently asked questions about open access publishing

Vassar's Open Access Policy

Vassar Faculty voted to enact an Open Access Policy in 2017. For more information and submission directions, see, Peer Reviewed Open Access Journal Articles Submission Guidelines.

Each member grants to Vassar College permission in the form of a nonexclusive, worldwide license to reproduce and publicly distribute, via Vassar’s institutional repository, each of their peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles, provided that the articles will not be sold for a profit. Each faculty member is expected to provide an electronic copy of the accepted manuscript of each article to the repository in an appropriate format as specified by the Vassar College Libraries.

The policy applies to all scholarly articles authored or co-authored while the person is a member of the Faculty of Vassar College; work completed prior to appointment at Vassar can be submitted at the faculty member’s discretion. For articles with copyright restrictions, and/or upon the express direction of the faculty author, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty will not apply the policy for a particular article or delay access for the necessary period of time. In collaboration with the Library Committee, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty will be responsible for interpreting and applying this policy.

Approved by the faculty at the Vassar College Faculty Meeting, May 10, 2017

Vassar Scholarship - Vassar's Institutional Repository

Vassar Scholarship collects, preserves, and provides access to scholarly works created at Vassar.  Vassar Scholarship also serves a publishing space for student research, such as capstone projects.

The items deposited in an institutional repository can be pre-prints, post-prints, or the final version.  Most journals allow pre-prints to be posted even if they own the copyright to the final version. See Institutional Repository Submission Guidelines & FAQ for how to submit your work; please log in to the Digital Library in order to access the submission link to deposit your work. 

What is an Open Access policy?

A number of institutions have issued policies detailing their support for Open Access to increase the visibility and impact of the institution's scholarly output. Typically, these policies revolve around an institutional repository that collects all of the work produced at that institution.

Many of the policies are based at least in part on a template of model policy language from HarvardHarvard University,  Amherst CollegeWellesley CollegeOberlin College and many other institutions, too numerous to list, have also adopted open access policies.

An OA policy may:

  • declare support for OA publishing.
  • require authors to deposit their works in the institutional repository.
  • limit publishing choices because of that requirement.
  • provide means of funding fee-based OA.
  • clarify which rights will remain with the author, which will be transferred to the publisher, and which will belong to the institution.