Setting up an Institutional Fund Bill Hubbard Head of Centre for Research Communications University of Nottingham

Compliance and Support Academic researchers need clarity Funders need compliance Institutions need clear funding routes Policies and publicity should alert researchers to their responsibilities under funder mandates Policies and publicity should reassure researchers that OA costs will be met Support systems should be in place to help - and monitor compliance A central OA Fund can help address this

Research Income and OA fees Direct costs: –Research grants can be used to fund OA fees during the life-time of a grant –Researchers need to be encouraged to build this into their grant applications Indirect costs: –Overheads claimed by the institution can also include OA fee costs –Funds need to be identifiable & accessible to researchers –Costs need to be built into institutional overhead costing models

Detailed Guidance: EPSRC Universities can recover publication fees incurred after a grant has ended as an indirect cost. This involves setting up funds and processes at an institutional or sub- institutional level. If a university chooses to set up a fund to enable their researchers to pay publication fees, it can form part of the costs used for calculating the universitys standard rate for the indirect costs of research. In the same way, a proportion of library costs are currently included in calculating the standard rate. Indirect costs are based on the annual attribution and reporting of costs in previous years, so universities can only start to include the costs of paying publication fees in their calculation of indirect cost the year after they first make provision. Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, Payments of Publication Fees

The UK Situation 2009 Survey of UK HE library directors, June valid responses –Russell Group: 11 –Pre-92 universities: 24 –New universities: 15 –HE colleges: 5

Central Funds? Question: Do you have an institutionally-coordinated approach to payment of per-article OA fees (such as a central fund)? Yes: 8 institutions (14%) No correlation between institution type and OA fund No clear pattern of responsibility in the institution for funds –7 of the 8 funds administered centrally 3 by library 3 by research support office 1 by graduate school

Institutional Context The possibility of setting up a fund has been raised in many institutions About 8 saw it as a real possibility in the next 12 months (varying levels of confidence) Some indicated alternative arrangements are in place e.g. devolved responsibility Library managers are usually the ones initiating discussions in institutions

Nottingham: Case Study Recommendations adopted by the University Research Committee, November 2006: 1.All authors should be encouraged to deposit copies of their papers in the Nottingham ePrints repository. 2.The University should identify a central budget upon which all authors in the institution can call to fund publications/OA charges. 3.Wellcome-funded authors should be reminded of the availability of funds to pay for their publications/OA charges. 4.Further internal publicity should be carried out in order to inform academic staff of the new requirements of funders. 5.Arrangements should be put in place to monitor the Universitys compliance with funder requirements.

Working with an OA Fund Approved in November 2006 Managed by the research support office (Research Innovation Services, RIS) Procedures document developed, March 2007 Publicity undertaken by RIS and Information Services Monitoring of the fund by RIS and IS Fund re-endorsed by Research Committee, 2008 Review of procedures Further publicity required

Usage Total number of requests over 3 years: 210 Requests per year – : 31 – : 79 – : 100 Over 3 years –BMC: 103 –Non-BMC: 107

Costs Total costs: £233,581 Costs per year: – : £28,597 – : £84,370 – : £120,614 Over 3 years –BMC: £106,566 –Non-BMC: £127,015

Costs Mean average cost per article: £1,112 –BMC articles: £1,035 –Non-BMC articles: £1,187 Highest payment: £2,975 Lowest payment: £347

Claimants Claimants predominantly from Medical and Life Sciences areas Faculties: –Medicine and Health Sciences: 49% –Science: 46% –Engineering: 1% –Social Sciences, Law and Education: 4% –Arts: none Within the Faculty of Science most claimants from Biology, Biosciences and Veterinary Science

Publishers Payments made to 26 publishers over 3 years Only 6 publishers received payments for more than 5 articles: –BMC: 103 –Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology: 9 –Elsevier: 9 –Oxford University Press: 9 –Public Library of Science: 6 –Springer: 10 Mean average publisher charge: £1,358 Learned society publishers: £1,242

Considerations for Institutions 1.Identify an institutional champion 2.Clarify funder policies 3.Establish clear institutional arrangements for cost recovery 4.Consider the most appropriate institutionally- coordinated arrangements 5.Agree policies for non-funded researchers 6.Develop clear policies for the Fund

Considerations for Institutions 7.Consider the relationship with library funding 8.Develop streamlined workflows 9.Undertake publicity 10.Provide proactive support for researchers 11.Monitor compliance 12.Review policies and funding regularly

Considerations for other stakeholders Publisher developments required: –streamlining workflows –achieving greater standardisation Consortial/national developments required: –negotiating with publishers on policies, workflows and price Funder developments required: –new workflows for compliance processes –work more closely with institutions on common aims for research outputs

Other considerations Control of price - still no open market Relationship with library funding Relationship of institutional repositories –funding for OA publishing –content for REF and management activities –within institutions information systems & workflows –used as support mechanism Alternatives? –if the timing of grant periods is the problem - then change the timing!

References SHERPA JULIET (funder policies) – SHERPA ROMEO (publisher copyright policies) – UUK/RIN guidance to UK institutions – With thanks to: –Chris Middleton for analysis of the Nottingham central fund usage statistics –Stephen Pinfield for the original version of this presentation

Questions? Bill Hubbard Head of Centre for Research Communications JISC Research Communication Strategist

CRC Summary SHERPA Partnership News - Information - Investigation SHERPA Services RoMEO - JULIET - OpenDOAR JISC Research Communications Strategy Strategy Development - Feedback - Dissemination SHERPA Projects RSP - NECOBELAC DRIVERII - OpenAIRE National Partner DRIVER Confederation COAR OA Research, Surveys, Projects University OA Services R & D