<font><font face="trebuchet ms,sans-serif">[Forwarding from Anneliese Taylor, via LibLicense. --Peter Suber.]<br></font></font><br><div class="gmail_quote"><br>From: "Taylor, Anneliese" <<a href="mailto:Anneliese.Taylor@ucsf.edu">Anneliese.Taylor@ucsf.edu</a>><br>
Date: Thu, 24 May 2012 00:32:57 +0000<br>
<br>
University of California, San Francisco Press Release<br>
May 23, 2012<br>
<br>
<br>
UCSF IMPLEMENTS POLICY TO MAKE RESEARCH PAPERS FREELY ACCESSIBLE TO PUBLIC<br>
<br>
Health Sciences Campus Becomes Largest in Nation to Adopt Open-access Policy<br>
<br>
The UCSF Academic Senate has voted to make electronic versions of<br>
current and future scientific articles freely available to the public,<br>
helping to reverse decades of practice on the part of medical and<br>
scientific journal publishers to restrict access to research results.<br>
<br>
The unanimous vote of the faculty senate makes UCSF the largest<br>
scientific institution in the nation to adopt an open-access policy<br>
and among the first public universities to do so.<br>
<br>
“Our primary motivation is to make our research available to anyone<br>
who is interested in it, whether they are members of the general<br>
public or scientists without costly subscriptions to journals,” said<br>
Richard A. Schneider, PhD, chair of the UCSF Academic Senate Committee<br>
on Library and Scholarly Communication, who spearheaded the initiative<br>
at UCSF. “The decision is a huge step forward in eliminating barriers<br>
to scientific research,” he said. “By opening the currently closed<br>
system, this policy will fuel innovation and discovery, and give the<br>
taxpaying public free access to oversee their investments in<br>
research.”<br>
<br>
UCSF is the nation’s largest public recipient of funding from the<br>
National Institutes of Health (NIH), receiving 1,056 grants last year,<br>
valued at $532.8 million. Research from those and other grants leads<br>
to more than 4,500 scientific papers each year in highly regarded,<br>
peer-reviewed scientific journals, but the majority of those papers<br>
are only available to subscribers who pay ever-increasing fees to the<br>
journals. The 10-campus University of California (UC) system spends<br>
close to $40 million each year to buy access to journals.<br>
<br>
Such restrictions and costs have been cited among the obstacles in<br>
translating scientific advances from laboratory research into improved<br>
clinical care.<br>
<br>
The new policy requires UCSF faculty to make each of their articles<br>
freely available immediately through an open-access repository, and<br>
thus accessible to the public through search engines such as Google<br>
Scholar. Articles will be deposited in a UC repository, other national<br>
open-access repositories such as the NIH-sponsored PubMed Central, or<br>
published as open-access publications. They will then be available to<br>
be read, downloaded, mined, or distributed without barriers.<br>
<br>
Schneider said hurdles do remain, including convincing commercial<br>
publishers to modify their exclusive publication contracts to<br>
accommodate such a policy. Some publishers already have demonstrated<br>
their willingness to do so, he said, but others, especially premier<br>
journals, have been less inclined to allow the system to change.<br>
<br>
Under terms negotiated with the NIH, a major proponent of open access,<br>
some of the premier journals only allow open access in PubMed Central<br>
one year after publication; prior to that only the titles and<br>
summaries of articles are freely available. How such journals will<br>
handle the UCSF policy remains to be seen, Schneider said.<br>
<br>
The UCSF policy gives the university a nonexclusive license to<br>
distribute any peer-reviewed articles that will also be published in<br>
scientific or medical journals. Researchers are able to “opt out” if<br>
they want to publish in a certain journal but find that the publisher<br>
is unwilling to comply with the UCSF policy. “The hope,” said<br>
Schneider, “is that faculty will think twice about where they publish,<br>
and choose to publish in journals that support the goals of the<br>
policy.”<br>
<br>
Full press release:<br>
<a href="http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2012/05/12056/ucsf-implements-policy-make-research-papers-freely-accessible-public" target="_blank">http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2012/05/12056/ucsf-implements-policy-make-research-papers-freely-accessible-public</a><br>
<br>
Full text of policy and supporting documents<br>
<a href="http://senate.ucsf.edu/2011-2012/j-lib-openaccess.html" target="_blank">http://senate.ucsf.edu/2011-2012/j-lib-openaccess.html</a><br>
<br>
Jennifer O’Brien Interim Executive Director/News<br>
Source: Kristen Bole <a href="tel:%28415%29%20502-6397" value="+14155026397">(415) 502-6397</a> (NEWS)<br>
E-mail: <a href="mailto:Kristen.Bole@ucsf.edu">Kristen.Bole@ucsf.edu</a><br>
Web: <a href="http://www.ucsf.edu" target="_blank">www.ucsf.edu</a><br>
Twitter: @KristenBole<br>
<br>
Anneliese Taylor<br>
Head of Collection Management<br>
University of California, San Francisco Library<br>
530 Parnassus Avenue<br>
San Francisco, CA 94143-0840<br>
<a href="tel:%28415%29%20476-8415" value="+14154768415">(415) 476-8415</a><br>
<a href="mailto:anneliese.taylor@ucsf.edu">anneliese.taylor@ucsf.edu</a><br>
</div><br>