What is Open Access
Open Access describes a way to publish your academic outputs (articles, book chapters, books, etc.).
The aim of Open Access is to make research accessible to all without restrictions or paywalls.
Research outputs should be discoverable and accessible to anyone online with an internet connection. The outputs are free to read and can be free to reuse.
It stems from the idea that a large part of research comes out of the public purse, and that this research should be publicly available to make the biggest impact.
As a University, with a mission to be society-shaping, publishing our research Open Access can help give it the widest reach possible.
Why Open Access?
The Open Access movement emerged in the early 2000's with a number of declarations know collectively as the BBB declarations.
- Budapest Open Access Initiative – February 2002.
- Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing – June 2003.
- Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities – October 2003.
These defined the principles of the Open Access as being able to:
“copy, use, distribute, transmit and display the work publicly and to make and distribute derivative works, in any digital medium for any responsible purpose, subject to proper attribution of authorship.” Cited in Suber, P. (2012). Open Access. MIT Press.
The movement emerged from frustrations experienced by academic researchers who started to denounce highly lucrative publishing practices that did not allow them to retain copyright of their own work, and blocked access to key research.
Academic librarians were ready to support the movement, as their budgets were diminishing while prices of subscriptions for access to academic journals increased. Universities that were producing the research found themselves unable to buy access to the work produced by their own researchers.
In the UK, the movement toward Open Access was supported and argued for through the Finch Review (2012), The Welcome Trust Open Access requirements, the UKRI adherence to the principles of Coalition S and the Research Exercise Framework (REF) implementing Open Access requirements since 2014.
Further mandates and policies are being developed. It is expected that REF2028 will continue the push towards OA.
Routes to Open Access
Green Route: Self-archiving with SURE
The University of Sunderland preference is for authors to use the Green Route to Open Access.
The Green Route is free and is compliant with most funders and with the requirements of the REF.
Through this route authors upload their Author Accepted Manuscript to the institutional repository (SURE). Remember that authors are responsible for depositing their outputs to SURE within 12 weeks of acceptance (not publication).
Different publishers will have different rules but the team will check this for you.
However, you can use the JISC Sherpa Romeo tool to check the Open Access policies of publishers and individual journals.
- Sherpa servicesThe new site for Sherpa services. You can use this portal to access Sherpa Romeo, Sherpa Juliet, Fact, and OpenDOAR. It also has Open Access compliance and transitional agreement look-up tools.
- SURE (Sunderland Repository)
Explore research written by University of Sunderland staff and students. You can browse theses by publication year.
Gold Route to Open Access
The Gold Route to Open Access is when the publisher makes the published version (also called Version of Record VoR) openly available from the point of publication.
Via this route you can publish in fully Open Access journals or in hybrid journals (part of the content is OA and part of the content is available via subscription).
This route can involve the payment of Article Processing Charges (APC) to the publisher.
The University has access to so-called transformational or Read and Publish deals. These agreements enable authors to publish Open Access. Make sure to check what is available when you plan your publications. Not all publishers have these deals in place. These deals might not include all the titles published by a given publisher.
For details of Read and Publish Deals currently available to us check the Read and Publish deal section of this guide.
Note that to access these deals you need to be the corresponding author.
Diamond Open Access
The journals or platforms adopting this model are generally community-driven, academic-led and academic-owned initiatives.
You can find some of these journals via DOAJ if you select the 'no charge' filter.
- Plan S - Diamond Open AccessInformation from PlanS about Diamond Open Access.