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IGI Global's OA Fee Waiver (Offset Model) Initiative provides a solution for researchers with the ever-evolving Plan S and related mandates

Will Plan S Succeed in Transforming Research Acquisition and Open Access (OA) Publishing?

By Sharlene Oong on Apr 16, 2019
According to a recent The Chronicle of Higher Education article, the OA movement is creating a “true tipping point in transforming the industry,” as Plan S and related mandates are sparking librarians to seek new ways to reduce subscription costs. As librarians are facing constraints within their current budgets, they are advocating for publishers to change their models, and some are even dropping multi-million-dollar subscription packages from larger publishers. Their faculty is also supporting their library’s decision by boycotting reviewing and publishing processes for these larger conglomerates.

Through these drastic measures, librarians are seeking “one package that [will] cover subscription charges and [OA] publishing fees,” which will allow their institution to affordably acquire content and enable their faculty’s research to be widely shared.

According to IGI Global experts in the field of knowledge management and open access, including Prof. Ratnaria Wahid and Prof. Bakri Mat from Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia, scholars face the challenge of obtaining research findings and relevant resources that are important for their research project, as stated their authored chapter, “Open Access Policies: Between Rights and Obligations,” from the publication Handbook of Research on Impacts of International Business and Political Affairs on the Global Economy.

In addition to researchers boycotting big publishers’ actions of selling journals in large bundles and charging astronomical amounts for journal subscriptions, this phenomenon is not new. As the UK House of Commons Science and Technology Committee (2003) reported, the publishers pricing and bundling policy has caused negative impacts the ability of librarians to purchase the journals required by their faculty members for academic purposes, according to Prof. Wahid and Prof. Mat.

Although the OA movement has paved the way for more accessible research for librarians and researchers, experts also address the opportunities, as well as the challenges OA represents for the academic community. “The particular access problem that OA attempts to address is the restrictive and rising cost of scholarly publications. The basic solution [that OA] presents is that research and information should be digitized, archived and made available without charge,” states Prof. Luke Bassuener from the University of Illinois, USA, in his authored chapter, “Knowledge in the Shrinking Commons: Libraries and Open Access in a Market-Driven World,” from the publication, Handbook of Research on Applied Learning Theory and Design in Modern Education.

While the OA movement does mean free access to information for the user, it does not necessarily mean it is free for the researcher to produce. As research takes an extended time to publish and comes at an astronomical cost, Prof. Bassuener also states that there are many costs that factor into providing research under OA and different ways the stakeholders will make that happen.

Although Plan S and related mandates continue to threaten the outcome of research activities conducted by scholars, the principles of OA continue to supplement the openness of the whole knowledge system, as open standards and open innovation also continue to be supported by OA in knowledge communities all over the world, according to Prof. Peter G. Raeth from AmeriTech, Beavercreek, USA, in his authored chapter, “Accessing Quality Open-Access Literature to Enable Teaching, Learning, and Industry,” from the International Journal of ICT Research in Africa and the Middle East (IJICTRAME).

As publishers continue to utilize subscription costs to gain profit, the development of the OA movement will not lose its luster, with industry-leading scholars conducting the most emerging research in OA, scholarly publishing, research methods, and more.

For years, IGI Global has been very mindful of the OA movement and the challenges libraries and researchers are both facing in research acquisition and OA publishing. Firmly believing that libraries should not have to stop their subscriptions in order to reallocate funds to support their faculty in publishing OA, we have launched an initiative that offers this “one package” through our OA Fee Waiver (Offset Model) Initiative. With this initiative, libraries will be able to maximize their investment in continuing resources, patrons will still be able to access the content they so desperately need to conduct their research, and faculty will enjoy the added benefit of having their OA article processing charges (APCs) covered while having their work published in credible, peer-reviewed journals.

“IGI Global has created a possible solution to [the] high OA prices by creating deposit accounts for their subscriptions to their journals which allows librarians to reinvest their journal costs in the OA movement to benefit them, their users, and their institution as well as the publishers,” states Dr. Mehdi Khosrow-Pour, President and CEO of IGI Global.

How it Works


    1. IGI Global will provide an extended trial for all participating members to all our e-books and e-journals.

    2. At the onset of the trial, we will negotiate and agree on pricing based on the number of participants with a predefined multiplier applied to the list price of each individual shared resource.

    3. Once the trial is complete, each participating member will make their selections (excel spreadsheet) from usage data (COUNTER reports) and/or select desired content based on needs.

    4. IGI Global will create a specialized bundle with the selected shared resources and provide perpetual or subscription access to participating members through IP authentication on IGI Global’s InfoSci® platform.

    5. IGI Global will match the libraries’ investments in the selected resources with a fund of equal value to go towards subsidizing the OA APCs for their patrons to be shared among all participating members.


“IGI Global has created a possible solution to [the] high OA prices by creating deposit accounts for their subscriptions to their journals which allows librarians to reinvest their journal costs in the OA movement to benefit them, their users, and their institution as well as the publishers,” states Dr. Mehdi Khosrow-Pour, President and CEO of IGI Global.

When a library subscribes to, or perpetually purchases, IGI Global’s InfoSci®-Books (4,500+ e-books) and InfoSci®-Journals (185+ e-journals) databases, IGI Global will match the investment with a fund of equal value that will go towards subsidizing the OA APCs for faculty when they submit an article under OA and it is accepted (following the peer review process) into any of IGI Global’s 185+ scholarly journals, which are published under the hybrid OA model. To take advantage of this OA initiative, librarians can contact IGI Global’s Database Team for more information, and researchers can recommend the InfoSci-Books and/or InfoSci-Journals databases to their librarian.
Find below a sample of related scholarly publishing titles which are also featured in IGI Global’s award-winning InfoSci-Books database and are available for purchase in print and electronic format. Be sure to recommend these titles to your librarian to ensure your institution can acquire the most emerging research. Additionally, for researchers, all of the chapters featured in these publications are available for purchase through IGI Global’s OnDemand feature for as low as US$ 30.

About IGI Global's InfoSci-Databases: IGI Global’s InfoSci®-Database consists of InfoSci-Books, a database of over 4,500+ reference books containing nearly 100,000 chapters, and InfoSci-Journals, a database of nearly 25,000 peer-reviewed articles and 1,000,000+ citation references sourced from over 185+ scholarly journals.

Featuring IGI Global’s robust collection of edited and authored reference books, handbooks of research, critical explorations, case books, and research insights, IGI Global's InfoSci-Books database is being offered with an annual subscription (2000-2019) as low as US$ 8,580 US$ 6,435* (one-time perpetual purchase for current copyright year (2019) offered as low as US$ 17,500 US$ 13,125**), this database ensures that librarians can affordably acquire emerging research for their institution.

IGI Global's InfoSci-Journals database is being offered with an annual subscription (2000-2019) as low as US$ 5,100 US$ 3,825*(one-time perpetual purchase for the current volume year (2019) offered as low as US$ 5,000 US$3,750**). This database contains peer-reviewed resources that have been featured in prestigious indices including Web of Science, Scopus, and more.

Purchase or recommend InfoSci-Books or InfoSci-Journals to your librarian.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are the authors’ own and do not reflect the views of IGI Global.
Newsroom Contact
Caroline Campbell
Marketing Manager
ccampbell@igi-global.com
(717) 533-8845, ext. 144
www.igi-global.com/

*InfoSci-Books US$ 6,435 annual subscription price and InfoSci-Journals US$ 3,825 annual subscription price are only available to new customers through IGI Global’s Library Account Program, and cannot be combined with most offers or multi-site use.

**Perpetual purchase option reflects pricing for all InfoSci-Books 2019 (600+ titles) pricing and pricing for all InfoSci-Journals issues released in 2019 for existing customers.

***The Open Access (OA) article processing charges will be waived after the student, faculty, or staff’s paper has been vetted and accepted into an IGI Global journal.
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