Scholarly Communication
ASU Open Access Policy
On March 27, 2017, the ASU University Senate voted to approve an open access policy for ASU. The policy reads:
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Faculty members are encouraged to grant a non-exclusive, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free license to Scholarly Works to Arizona State University to exercise any and all rights under copyright as are necessary to achieve the goals of open access, dissemination, and preservation and to authorize others to do the same, provided that this license is solely for educational and non-commercial purposes. When granting this license, Faculty members will provide, at no cost to the university, a copy of those Scholarly Works to the university so that the university may exercise its rights given by this license and comply with its obligations to sponsors or other third parties. This expressly includes the right for the university to deposit Scholarly Works in any university or third party repository.
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However, upon accepting or receiving an external grant or contract which includes a public or open access policy, each Faculty member automatically grants to Arizona State University the license as defined in section one to any Scholarly Works resulting from that grant or contract.
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Under this policy, the author retains copyright ownership, unless that author chooses to transfer rights to other parties, such as a publisher. Arizona State University retains only the limited rights outlined in section one.
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The policy applies to all Scholarly Works authored or co- authored while the person is a member of the Faculty. Not included in this policy are any articles completed before the adoption of this policy and any articles for which the Faculty member entered into an incompatible licensing or assignment agreement before the adoption of this policy, nor any Scholarly Work that is not related to Arizona State University.
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The Office of the Provost will be responsible for interpreting this policy, resolving disputes concerning its interpretation and application, and recommending changes to the Faculty as needed.
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The University Senate will review the policy no less frequently than every three years and a report will be made available to the Faculty.
U.S. funding agencies
The Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) issued a memorandum, "Ensuring Free, Immediate, and Equitable Access to Federally Funded Research" on August 25th, 2022 directing all federal agencies to update their public access policies and require all federally funded research to be free and immediately accessible. This expands on the 2013 Memorandum, which only required certain federal agencies to provide publicly accessible research and data within 12 months of publication. The updated guidance now requires any research that receives federal funding to be freely accessible without a delay. Agencies with research and development expenditures of at least $100 million annually will submit their initial public access plan updates by February 21, 2023. Agencies with smaller research and development expenditures will have until August 20, 2023. All federal agencies must have updated plans in place by December 31st, 2025. Further guidance on this will be forthcoming, and researchers who receive federal funding may reach out to us with questions about making their publications and data freely accessible.
Here are some resources to help stay informed.
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OSTP 2013 & 2022 Public Access Memo ComparisonThis comparison breaks down the 2013 and 2022 Office of Science and Technology (OSTP) public access guidance into sections for a quick side-by-side comparison of ten key components, including embargo period, data policies, formats, and metadata expectations.
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Frequently Asked Questions: 2022 Public Access Policy GuidanceFrom the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy
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FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Announces New Actions to Advance Open and Equitable ResearchOSTP launches Year of Open Science to advance national open science policies across the federal government in 2023, including new grant funding, improvements in research infrastructure, broadened research participation for emerging scholars, and expanded opportunities for public engagement.
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SPARC Fact Sheet on the 2022 White House OSTP MemoA brief overview of the policy guidance set out by the WHOSTP for federal funding agencies to include in their updated plans.
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HELIOS 2022 OSTP Memo OverviewA brief infographic outlining key elements of the 2022 OSTP memo, provided by HELIOS (Higher Education Leadership Initiative for Open Scholarship)
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Federal Agency Article and Data Sharing RequirementsThis site, managed by SPARC, tracks, compares, and interprets U.S. federal funding agency requirements for sharing research articles and data.
Funding Agency Policies
Due to the growing demand for a visible and public return on funded research, more and more funding agencies are adopting open access or data-archiving mandates as a condition of funding. Here are some of the largest non-governmental policies:
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Bill & Melinda Gates FoundationWe have adopted an Open Access policy that enables the unrestricted access and reuse of all peer-reviewed published research funded, in whole or in part, by the foundation, including any underlying data sets.
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Howard Hughes Medical InstituteThese policies also are intended to ensure that our research furthers the public good and thus set forth guidelines for making research materials, tools, and publications widely accessible within the scientific community and beyond.
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The Wellcome TrustThe Wellcome Trust supports unrestricted access to the published output of research as a fundamental part of its charitable mission and a public benefit to be encouraged wherever possible.
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Wellcome Trust Policy on data, software and materials management and sharingNew policy, updated on July 24, 2017.
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SHERPA/JULIETInternational list of funding agencies' open access publishing, archiving, and data archiving policies
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Open Research Funders GroupA partnership of funding organizations committed to the open sharing of research outputs. Inaugural members are: the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the American Heart Association, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the James S. McDonnell Foundation, the John Templeton Foundation, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.