New Open Access Monograph Initiative Announced

UC Davis is one of twelve universities initially participating in a joint initiative of the Association of American Universities (AAU), Association of Research Libraries (ARL), and Association of American University Presses (AAUP) to provide support for the publication of open access monographs. The press release announcing the initiative describes the project in more detail:

The universities and colleges directly participating in this initiative will incorporate three components into their digital monograph publishing projects: provide a baseline university publishing grant of $15,000 to support the publication of an open access, digital monograph of 90,000 words or less (with additional funding for works of greater length or complexity to be negotiated by the author, institution, and publisher); set a target of awarding at least three publishing grants per year; and commit to participating in this initiative for five years.

While open access publishing is increasingly available for monographs (for instance, through UC Press’ Luminos imprint), the substantial investment required can be a stumbling block for interested authors. For the UC Davis Library, participation in this latest initiative is a sensible and timely way of helping our community overcome these obstacles and be able to publish books that enjoy the visibility and readership open access facilitates.