Swansea University Research Publications Policy

University Research Week 2023  – Policy Launch Events
Monday 11/09/2023, 10.30-12.00 GH014, Bay Campus
Reserve Your Place 
Thursday 14/09/2023, 10.30-12.00 Wallace 218, Singleton Campus
Reserve Your Place 

Project Sponsor: Biagio Lucini, Deputy Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research Culture 

Swansea University has updated its Research Publications Policy as part of a commitment to open and reproducible research. The University is dedicated to disseminating its research and scholarship as widely as possible.  From July 2023 the policy supports authors to retain more intellectual property rights in their research outputs. The ability to retain rights is a key benefit for researchers, and the University is at the forefront of bringing this policy into action as the first Welsh institution to adopt a rights retention policy. 

Our new Research Publications Policy grants Swansea researchers the right to make a copy of the Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) immediately Open Access at publication via the repository (Cronfa), using a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). By making articles immediately available with no publisher embargo, researchers can ensure their work reaches a wide audience, increasing visibility and potential impact.    

The policy applies to: 

• In-scope funded and unfunded peer reviewed research articles (published in either a journal, conference proceeding or publishing platform).  
• Book chapters.  

Articles which are not eligible for paid Open Access at acceptance can be deposited in the repository (Cronfa), without embargo and with a CC BY license using the green self-archiving Open Access route. Articles made gold Open Access via an article payment charge or ‘Read and Publish’ agreement are unaffected.  The University recognises that there may be situations where it is difficult to follow this policy completely and it is possible to opt out of the requirement for open access or the assignment of a CC-BY licence.  This may make your output funder non-compliant.

Full details of the new Research Publications Policy are available via libguides.swansea.ac.uk/Research-Publishing/Publication-Policy along with support videos and FAQs.  

The Library Research Support team will be presenting the policy changes at various research events over the summer, but please do get in touch if you have any questions for us. LibraryResearchSupport@swansea.ac.uk    
#RightsRetentionFAQs, #Creative Commons, #Benefits for Researchers

Swansea University and the Springer Nature Read and Publish Negotiation

Key Points

• JISC / UK Universities are currently engaged in negotiations with Springer Nature to agree a sustainable ‘Read & Publish’ deal.
• Springer Compact, Nature research journals and Palgrave titles are included in the publisher portfolio.
• Springer Nature have confirmed that there will be a grace period of read access to subscription content and a continuation of Springer Compact open access publishing until the end of March 2023.
• An agreement is important for researchers to fulfil funder open access policy requirements. If an open access journal or APC (article processing charge) payment is not available, authors can meet their obligations by using a rights retention statement at the point of submission in hybrid journals. Releasing the accepted manuscript immediately at the point of publication in the repository with a CC-BY licence will be compliant for UKRI.
• Individual payments by the University for all APCs in this portfolio may be withdrawn if negotiations conclude without agreement. Further information will be circulated if this scenario occurs.
• If the sector walks away from the negotiation and suspend subscriptions, we will provide additional inter-library loan services to provide research reading. Access to historical subscription materials will continue to be available under agreed retention rights. We recommend that you install a browser extension plugin to your device for seamless access to articles. Try CORE Discovery, or Unpaywall for open access versions, or LibKey to obtain access to articles provided by Swansea University Library.

Read more about the JISC / Springer Nature Open Access Agreement Negotiation for the UK

Why do I need to know about this negotiation?

The transition to open access publishing is fulfilled through a range of transformative agreements in consultation with a wide selection of stakeholders. This supports the wide dissemination and free access to our research and helps to constrain costs, accelerate open access and increase transparency. Universities in the UK spend around £30 million a year with Springer Nature, the second largest publisher of all UK research.

The current deal with Springer ended on 31 December 2022 and JISC are acting on behalf of the sector in the current negotiation for an expanded read and publish agreement. If successful, an acceptable agreement will cover the whole Springer Nature journal portfolio – Springer Compact journals, Palgrave journals, Nature journals and their fully open access titles.

Why do we need an agreement?

• To facilitate ‘read’ access to published journal content in their portfolio.
• A new transitional Read & Publish agreement will provide open access publishing for UK authors in Springer Nature journals at no direct cost to the individual researcher.

Many funders require their open access funding to be used in journals that are part of a transitional agreement. They are driving change from an individual and institutional payment model (article payment charges and library journal subscriptions) to one where the library budget fairly supports the publishing services at institutional level. Springer Nature will be paid for providing access to their journal portfolio and for corresponding authors to publish reviews and primary research articles under one single agreement.

However, most funded researchers are not required to pay for open access in Springer-Nature portfolio journals. The self-archiving route for the author accepted manuscript (AAM) via a repository is still available for publishing in hybrid (open access and subscription) journals. To meet funder requirements UKRI authors should continue to use a rights retention statement at the point of submission. This will enable immediate open access by depositing the accepted manuscript with a CC-BY licence in Cronfa via the Research Information System (RIS).

Rights Retention
Include this statement in your submission cover letter and the acknowledgement statement:

“For the purpose of Open Access, the author has applied a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript arising from this submission.”

We strongly encourage all authors to utilise this zero-cost publication route in order to support the ongoing negotiations. Nature open access costs are remarkably high compared to the average cost of APCs and price restraint is required.

What happens next?

Springer Nature have confirmed that there will be a grace period of ‘read’ access to subscription content and a continuation of Springer Compact publishing until the end of February 2023. Individual payments by the University for APCs in this publisher portfolio may be withdrawn if negotiations conclude without agreement. Further information will be circulated if this occurs.

We will continue to update our website and the Effective Research Publishing Handbook as information becomes available.
Contact us: LibraryResearchSupport@swansea.ac.uk

UKRI Open Access Policy Update

UKRI Logo

The UKRI Open Access (OA) Policy sets out the requirements for publications that acknowledge funding from UKRI or any of its councils. The new OA policy requires immediate open access to be the default for research articles. This positive change will ensure that publicly funded research is openly available at the point of publication. 

The new policy comes into effect for research articles submitted for publication on or after 1 April 2022 and is similar to the cOAlition S and Wellcome open access initiatives. In-scope monographs, book chapters and edited collections published on or after 1 January 2024 are included for the first time. 

UKRI will provide a £46.7 million Open Access block grant to support implementation of this policy however, the ring-fenced budget for OA monograph publishing is not significant at £3.5 million for the sector. UKRI will release further information on the block grant and conditions of funding in December 2021 and in 2022 for monographs. Swansea University Library is responsible for supporting Faculties to achieve compliance with the URKRI Open Access policy and receives the block grant to support researchers.  

Requirements of the new policy 

For peer-reviewed research articles, reviews and conference papers with an ISSN, key requirements include: 

• immediate open access for research articles submitted for publication on or after 1 April 2022.  
• articles can be open through an open access journal or platform using the ‘gold’ route, or via ‘green’ self-archiving of the author accepted manuscript (AAM) in an institutional or subject repository without an embargo period. 
• authors can only access UKRI funds to publish in a gold open access journal or in a subscription “hybrid” journal covered by a JISC transitional agreement.  
• a  Creative Commons CC-BY licence or CC-BY-ND (by exception) is required, including a requirement to notify the publisher of this licensing at the point of submission. UKRI provide rights retention strategy (RRS) boilerplate text for ‘green’ self-archiving purposes. Using a rights retention strategy is a cultural shift for authors and will be a funder requirement. 

‘For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a CC BY public copyright licence (where permitted by UKRI, ‘Open Government Licence’ or ‘CC BY-ND public copyright licence’ may be stated instead) to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising’ 

• articles must include a Data Access Statement, even where there are no data associated with the article or the data are inaccessible. 

Key requirements of the new policy for monographs published on or after 1 January 2024 include: 

• the final version of a publication or accepted manuscript are made open access via a publisher’s website, platform or repository, within a maximum of 12 months of publication or the accepted manuscript must be deposited in a repository. 
• a  Creative Commons CC-BY licence is preferred, but NC and ND licences are permitted for monographs. 
• UKRI’s licensing requirements do not apply to any materials included within a long-form output that are provided by third-party copyright holders – see the policy exceptions. 

Preprints are not included within the new policy but the use of pre-print services across disciplines is encouraged. A statement on pre-prints is expected at some point. 

Read the new UKRI open access policy
Read ‘Shaping our open access policy’ by UKRI

Read the cOAlition S ‘Primer on the Rights Retention Strategy by Stephen J Elgin. 

The Library Research Support team will be adding policy updates to the Effective Research Publishing Handbook as they become available. Details of JISC transitional publishing agreements applicable to Swansea University researchers are also available from this resource. Faculty administrators and directors are encouraged to make contact for further guidance to ensure that researchers are able to comply with the new funder requirements.

Contact ISS-Research@swansea.ac.uk / openaccess@swansea.ac.uk

PLOS Open Access Publication Fees

JISC – PLOS Flat Fee Arrangement 2021

From January 1 2021 until December 31 2023 publication fees for open access will be automatically covered by the flat fee publisher agreement with Swansea University Library for the following titles:

PLOS Computational Biology, PLOS Pathogens, PLOS Genetics, PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases and PLOS ONE.

To be eligible for full payment of publications fees, the corresponding author must be affiliated with Swansea University. Please ensure that you use your Swansea University email address and identify your affiliation in the publisher submission system. 

• All article types in the five eligible journals are covered under the flat fee deal.
• Articles will be automatically published with a Creative Commons CC-BY Attribution license. PLOS articles are archived in LOCKSS and syndicated to PubMed Central/EuropePMC. PLOS requires data sharing where not subject to legal or ethical restrictions and has adopted the CRediT taxonomy.

PLOS reserves the right to accept or reject applications for financial support. If PLOS or the institution choose to reject the payment for Article Processing Charges (APCs), PLOS will invoice the authors individually, who retain full payment responsibility.

Further details on all open access publisher agreements and discounts for Swansea University researchers are listed on our Open Access Financial Support for APCs webpage.

Go to the recent PLOS blog on APC-free Open Access Agreement

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Academic Publishing 101: The Journal Process

Often we assume that new researchers are already aware of how the process of submitting an article to a journal goes, and how long it takes, so this is a back-to-basics post to take you through the process step-by-step.

First things first: Choosing a Journal

There seems to be a new Journal announced online every other week, and this includes ‘predatory journals’ so how can you tell if a journal you may want to submit to is legitimate?

There are some online services designed to help you choose a journal – for example, Elsevier Journal Finder, Journal Selector. 

1. Check their website; does it look professional? Does it link to other sites, for example members of the editorial board and their home institutions? Is the grammar and spelling up to scratch?

2. Are they indexed? To be indexed by the main databases (like Scopus and Web of Science) a journal has to adhere to strict criteria. Google Scholar is not transparent in the way they indexed and therefore can’t be reliable. 

To check whether the journal is indexed go to Scopus or Web of Science and search the Journal title. 

3. Some Journal titles are very similar so it is a good idea to check the ISSN. The ISSN should appear on the Journal ‘About’ pages, and you can check it on a site like Sherpa Romeo or search the Library Hub Discover for more information about the Journal. If it doesn’t appear on either of them, be wary. 

What is a Journal Impact Factor and can it help me here?

The Journal Impact Factor is a measure reflecting the annual average (mean) number of citations to recent articles published in that journal. The JIF can be useful in comparing the relative influence of journals within a discipline, as measured by citations. However, it cannot be used as an indicator of the quality of individual articles or authors

If you’re still not sure, just get in touch and email me; e.c.downes@swansea.ac.uk

Submission process

The turn around time between submitting your article, having it reviewed and acceptance varies between discipline. It can take weeks or months so check the journal’s submission information for an estimate

Open Access and Copyright

The point at which decisions on Copyright and Open Access have to be made varies between journals but is generally around the Acceptance stage.

 You need to know a few things;

1. If you intend to publish the ‘traditional route’ or in ‘subscription articles’, this means that you do not pay any publishing costs, but your article will be behind a paywall for anyone outside of a university, or in a university which doesn’t have a subscription to that journal. In this case you will be asked to transfer copyright to the publisher.

In this case, to comply with Swansea OA Policy, you will need to upload the Accepted Manuscript into RIS as ‘Green Open Access’

2. If you intend to publish Gold Open Access with the journal, this tends to result in the journal requiring an ‘APC’ – Article Processing Charge usually £2500+. More information about APCs and financing them are found on our Open Access page. 

If this is the route you choose, the article is assigned a ‘Creative Commons‘ license which allows you to keep the copyright. The article is then freely available to anyone whether they subscribe to the journal or not.

For more information about Copyright and Author’s rights please see our Copyright guide, especially ‘Scholarly Works – Author Agreements with Publishers’

After Acceptance

What do I need to do after the article has been accepted?

1. Create a record in RIS following the guidance. This ensures that your paper complies with REF rules if it is eligible. If you don’t have the full details to fill in the record, that is fine. You or our team can fill in the details later, when information like the DOI, Volume and Issue number become available.

2. Share your work! If you don’t promote your work, who will?

Inspec Analytics: tools for engineering, computing & physics research

Inspec and Inspec Analytics from the Institution of Engineering and Technology, are highly specialised discovery and research intelligence tools that provide detailed insights into research trends and patterns across physics and engineering disciplines at both local and global levels. The granularity of the Inspec index makes it easy to analyse research output by organisation and/or specific subjects, allowing you to monitor research output over time, compare output between organisations, stay up to date with emerging trends, find collaboration opportunities and identify the most relevant  journals and conferences to publish work.

From 2021, all IET journals will become Open Access. This approach builds on a strategy that began in 2012 when the IET launched its first open access journal, The Journal of Engineering. The IET now has 15 wholly open access journals with open access publication routes in the remaining 27 journals. 

To Access Inspec Analytics, first go to Inspec, then underneath the search bar, click ‘Go to Inspec Analytics’

For training and tips on using Inspec and Inspec Analytics to inform your research strategy, and identifying emerging trends in your field, contact Ellie Downes, Research Librarian at e.c.downes@swansea.ac.uk

For further information about Inspec Analytics, check out some of their guides here;

Inspec Analytics user guide and videos: https://inspec-analytics.theiet.org/inspec-analytics-user-guide/ 

Sources indexed in Inspec: https://www.theiet.org/media/6168/inspec-active-journals.pdf  

More about Inspec’s subject classifications: https://www.theiet.org/publishing/inspec/inspec-content-coverage/inspec-classification/  

SAGE Open Access

WHEEL (Wales Higher Education Electronic Library)

SAGE has an agreement with WHEEL (Wales Higher Education Electronic Library) from 2020 to December 2022.

The details of the agreement are as follows: 

Subscription journals
Corresponding authors publishing an article in 900+ subscription journals in the current SAGE Premier package which offers hybrid open access publishing (SAGE Choice) can be published open access at a highly discounted rate of 200 GBP.  

Authors do not need to take any action to benefit from this offer. SAGE will contact all eligible authors to inform them of the agreement and invite them to the SAGE Open Access Portal to take any additional steps needed to make their article open access under the terms of this agreement. 

Gold open access journals 
Corresponding authors publishing an article in a gold open access journal are also entitled to a 20% discount on the prevailing article processing charge (APC) for that journal. Click here for the participating Gold journal title list. This discount will be applied automatically in the SAGE Open Access Portal. Where an author is eligible for more than one discount, discounts cannot be combined but the highest discount available to the author will be applied to the APC due.

Eligible corresponding authors should use their Swansea University email address in all applications.

• The Author(s) can then accept or reject Open Access Publishing, and if selecting Open Access, digitally sign the publishing agreement. The Author(s) have 14 days to make the selection, otherwise the article will continue to be published in subscription format.
• The Author(s) then select a billing method for the £200 fee. They can pay directly by Credit Card or Invoice; or they can assign a third party bill-payer.
• Please note: this discount cannot be applied retrospectively (after the 14 days has elapsed).
• Some titles are excluded from this agreement and are listed here.

Corresponding authors who are funded by UKRI can apply for Swansea University financial support by completing the online application form at the point of acceptance. Full details are on the Open Access Library Guide.

SAGE Choice FAQs

Publish Open Access with IOP Publishing

Image credit: @IOPPublishing

IOP Publishing (IOP), Jisc Collections and Swansea University Library Service have come to an agreement which enables researchers to publish their work on an open access basis at no additional cost in the majority of IOP’s hybrid journals. The agreement balances the cost of hybrid article publication charges (APCs) against journal license fees for 2020 onwards.

All corresponding (submitting) authors can publish in eligible journals open access without barriers, without additional cost, and be certain that they comply to any open access requirement. Eligible hybrid titles are available from this list.

Research articles and reviews (letters, papers, reviews and special issue articles) accepted for publication after 1 Jan 2020 are eligible, IOP will automatically identify qualifying articles and inform authors of their inclusion.

Included in the agreement are all subscription journals, owned by IOP Publishing, which offer a hybrid open access option. In addition, the agreement also includes selected journals which are published by IOP Publishing on behalf of our society partners.

How to take advantage of the agreement

1. Identify yourself clearly in the article submission form and the article itself
2. Use a Swansea University email address
3. Follow the IOP submission instructions 

Articles are published with a Creative Commons CC-BY licence at no cost to you.

Discounted APCs

Corresponding (submitting) authors at subscribing institutions can also benefit from a 70% discount on the standard APC of hybrid journals not included in the above list that are published with some of our partner societies. Please visit IOP for further details. This discount is not available for any journal that is funded by page charges or submissions fees.

Open Access Publishing with Wiley

                               

Publish Your Open Access Research Articles with Wiley
From March 2020 Swansea University is a participating UK institution in partnership with Wiley and the JISC Open Access Agreement for Institutions. This researcher support is provided by the Swansea University Library Service.

Image: WOCinTech Chat (CC-BY-2.0)

Author’s may publish articles in any of Wiley’s fully Gold Open Access, or OnlineOpen hybrid (subscription) journals with no open access costs to the author*. A list of Wiley’s Open Access and hybrid subscription journals is available from the Open Access Author Dashboard together with access to an Author Compliance Tool so you can check if you meet your funder obligations.

To publish without having to pay additional Article Publication Charges (APCs), the corresponding author must be from a participating UK institution and the article must have been accepted on or after 2 March 2020.

Eligibility criteria:

• Your manuscript must have been accepted on or after 2 March 2020
• You must be the corresponding author who is affiliated with a participating UK institution at the point of acceptance
• You must publish open access in a fully gold OA journal or a hybrid (subscription) journal that offers OnlineOpen
• If publishing in a hybrid (subscription) journal, you must order OnlineOpen at the point of acceptance by using the Wiley Author Services workflow 
• As the Wiley Open Access Account holder, the Library Research Support team will authorise your request provided you meet the eligibility criteria. Please use a Swansea University email address to help us authenticate your application. We will contact you directly if we need additional information before approving your request
• This agreement cannot be used to cover additional charges (e.g. cover, color, and page charges), which individual journals administer separately
• Please ensure that you acknowledge your funder and provide details for any supporting data in the published article. This is a requirement for research articles supported by many funders, including UKRI

Quick Links:
How to Order Online Open
Author Compliance Tool

*subject to availability of sufficient funds and approval from eligible institutions’ Wiley Open Access Account holders.

You can find further details on our Open Access Library Guide.

Well-being of Family Carers – What does this mean and why does it matter?

Wellbeing icon

Can you help with this Swansea University research study?

Why is this research being carried out?

Governments at both the UK and Wales level have identified that the well-being of carers is going to be essential for looking after an ageing population. However, identifying what this means for carers is inconsistent and not agreed upon.  This research will be used to inform policy development and service delivery going forward and is approved by Research Ethics Committee, College of Human and Health Sciences, Swansea University.

Who is it about?

The purpose of the research is to develop a better understanding of what well-being really means for family carers with a focus on those caring for someone over 50.  If you are caring for someone aged over 50 we would like to hear from you. 

What does it involve?

The research involves a telephone conversation with a researcher who will ask you about yourself and the person or people you care for. You will then be invited to participate in a more structured interview, focus group or both depending on your time commitments.

Both the interview and the focus group will concentrate on discussing questions about your understanding of well-being and what this means to you. In total, the process should not take more than 3 hours to complete.  A £10 gift token is offered to all participants as a thank you for taking part. 

Where is it taking place?

Focus groups will take place at locations across South Wales with specific venues being decided to accommodate those interested. Date and times will be discussed and agreed upon during the initial interview.  All reasonable travel and subsistence expenses will be covered and refreshments will be provided on the day.

If you would like to find out more or take part in the research please contact the researcher at the contact details below:

Maria Cheshire-Allen, PhD candidate, Centre for Innovative Ageing

• Email:  m.cheshire-allen@swansea.ac.uk
• Telephone number 01792 295886
• Post:  Room 18 Haldane Building, Singleton Campus, Swansea University SA2 8PP