Open Access

UCCS Academic Affairs support the goal of making UCCS research findings immediately and freely available worldwide via publication in open access journals.

The Open Access Fund is intended to support that goal by providing a means for authors without access to funds from other sources to pay for reasonable article processing or publishing fees charged by full open access publishers.

This effort is funded with a 50% - 50% split between the Office of Research and the requesting author’s primary college and determined on a case-by case basis depending on funding availability. Requests to the Open Access Fund are considered in consultation with the Kraemer Family Library to determine eligibility.

Articles that comply with the eligibility criteria (below) will be funded on a first-come, first-served basis until available funds are exhausted.

Funding doesn’t imply an endorsement of any journal, nor does it imply an assessment of the quality or research value of any article.

Eligibility Criteria

Authors

Current UCCS faculty and current undergraduate or graduate students may request funding up to $2,000 per fiscal year (July 1 to June 30) to pay for article-processing or publishing fees for full open access journals. Priority is given to tenure/tenure track faculty and graduate students who are required to publish for evaluation and promotion purposes. 

Articles

Any peer-reviewed research article accepted into a journal meeting the criteria is eligible if the article is not yet published. Authors must submit for funding approval as soon as the paper is accepted for publication and the open-access fee is known. If the article is already published, the author may still submit for possible funding 1) if the account is in good-standing (not a past-due notice) and 2) for a max limit of $1000. At this time, we do not offer pre-approval for articles not yet accepted for publication.

Journals Criteria

Any journal that provides free, immediate, online access to the full text of all research articles and follows accepted best practices for open access publishing is eligible. This includes, but isn’t limited to, journals listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals. At a minimum, journals must be compliant with the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association’s Code of Conduct. In accordance with the Compact for Open Access Publishing Equity, so-called “hybrid” open access journals that provide free online access for only some articles will not be eligible for funding.

Alternative Funding Options

This fund is intended to support open access to research articles where publication fees are not covered by grants, start-up funds, an author’s indirect cost recoveries, or other funding sources. UCCS encourages authors to include publication fees in grant requests whenever possible. This fund isn’t intended to replace such funding sources.

Multiple Authors

Funding is limited to $2,000 per article regardless of the number of authors. Funding for articles with multiple UCCS authors will be prorated (e.g., if there are two UCCS authors on the same article, each author can request up to $1,000 or they can submit one joint application). Funding for articles with authors from other institutions will be prorated to split the cost with the non-UCCS institution (e.g., if there are two UCCS authors and one non-UCCS author, UCCS will pay 2/3 of the fees up to the max $2000). Applicants are therefore required to solicit funds from non-UCCS authors.

Institutional Repository Submission Requirement

Applicants who receive funding are expected to submit a PDF copy of the published version to the UCCS University Archives for inclusion of the article to UCCS repository at the time of publication.

Attribution

In the author’s acknowledgements, please include the statement: Publication of this article was funded by the University of Colorado Colorado Springs Open Access Fund.

Application Process

If the above criteria are met, the Open Access Fund Application Form can be used to request funds. Requests for publisher payment may be made as soon as an article is accepted and a statement or invoice for publication charges is received. 

Authors will be notified via email upon approval of funding (typically within ten business days). Payment will be made directly to the publisher.

*Adopted from the CU Boulder Library Open Access Fund