Falvey Library is committed to support open access journal publication through the Scholarship Open Access Reserve (SOAR) Fund. This program is designed to provide financial support to Villanova faculty who are interested in publishing in high quality open access journals. Faculty may be eligible to have article processing fees incurred for publishing in open access journals paid by the library.

“On a grand scale, Open Access is important because it advances the dissemination of scholarship and knowledge, paving the way for solving problems big and small and improving and even saving lives,” says Linda Hauck, Business Librarian, Falvey Library.

The program in 2018-19 funded 9 papers and supported 17 Villanovans’ research. Departments served (below) included eight from across three of the University’s Colleges.

The average award for Article Processing Charges (APC) ranged from $554 to $5,200, with an average of $1190. Five of those APCs were shared with other centers.

“On the local level, the revenue model for scholarly publication is perverse and from the perspective of academic libraries unsustainable. I’m really excited that one of Falvey Library’s key values is ‘openness,’ because it helps propel Falvey into advancing OA on multiple dimensions,” Hauck adds.

Shawn Proctor is Communication and Marketing Manager at Falvey Memorial Library.

Open access to information–the free, immediate, online access to the results of scholarly research, and the right to use and re-use those results as you need–has the power to transform the way research and scientific inquiry are conducted. It has direct and widespread implications for academia, medicine, science, industry, and for society as a whole.

Open Access (OA) has the potential to maximize research investments, increase the exposure and use of published research, facilitate the ability to conduct research across available literature, and enhance the overall advancement of scholarship. Research funding agencies, academic institutions, researchers and scientists, teachers, students, and members of the general public are supporting a move towards Open Access in increasing numbers every year. Open Access Week is a key opportunity for all members of the community to take action to keep this momentum moving forward.

Falvey Memorial Library has committed to support open access journal publication with the Scholarship Open Access Reserve (SOAR) Fund.  This program is designed to provide financial support to Villanova faculty who are interested in publishing in high quality open access journals. Faculty may be eligible to have article processing fees incurred for publishing in open access journals paid by the library.

Learn more about how to engage with Falvey Library’s Scholarship Open Access Reserve (SOAR) Fund!

Open Access Logo

Falvey Memorial Library is pleased to have an institutional membership to Hindawi Publishing Corporation. Launched in 1997, Hindawi publishes a growing number of open access journals in engineering, medicine and the sciences, and now includes Nursing Research and Practice, as well as social sciences titles such as Journal of Anthropology and Urban Studies Research. A complete list of current Hindawi titles is available at the company’s website.

So what is open access (OA)? In the words of SPARC researcher Peter Suber, “Open Access is a publishing model that provides immediate, worldwide, barrier-free access to the full text of research articles without requiring a subscription to the journal in which these articles are published.” (Read more about open access here.) Publication costs are usually covered by the authors, the author’s institution or research funds. The OA business model facilitates the rapid sharing of scholarly research. It also offers an alternative to traditional subscription-based journal publishing, whose ever -soaring costs threaten to consume academic library budgets.

Because of Falvey’s institutional membership, the processing fee will be waived for all Villanova University authors whose articles are accepted for publication in Hindawi journals. (Please note that this fee waiver applies to articles submitted on or after February 15, 2012, the starting date of the library’s institutional membership).

Articles submitted to Hindawi journals undergo the same rigorous peer-review process as those submitted to subscription-access journals. In addition, many Hindawi titles are part of the International Scholarly Research Network (ISRN), a series of peer-reviewed, open-access journals with a 28-day review cycle.

For a list of Villanova University scholars participating in Hindawi journals as authors, editors, and reviewers, visit http://www.hindawi.com/institutions/villanova.edu/