This information sets out the University’s framework for ensuring that scholarly outputs authored by University researchers, staff and students are made Open Access (OA), where applicable.

Definitions of terms in bold type are given in Annex B¹.

University of Warwick’s position on Open Access

As a leading research institution the University of Warwick places high value on the research carried out under its aegis, whether this is produced alone or in collaboration with others.

The University is committed to disseminating the fruits of its research and scholarship as widely as possible to contribute to society as well as to academic advancement. This is in line with the University’s research strategy², core values³ and in response to the increased expectations from HEFCE/Research England, funding bodies and the more general public that scholarly research outputs from publically funded research are made as freely available as possible.

To this end the University favours, now and for the foreseeable future, open access by means of the Green route, except in those cases where the Gold route may be required by the funder of the research and provision for any requisite charges has been made.

The University recognises that the different types of scholarly output resulting from this research are key assets and should be recorded and managed by the University in a way that brings most benefit, for the University, its researchers and for the global community. The University will provide the mechanisms and infrastructure to help researchers to make their scholarly outputs open access and take advantage of the benefits of this for their research impact and profile. These mechanisms will also support researchers to comply with the requirements of their funder’s open access policies. However, researchers must bear some of the responsibility for complying with these policies, as well as with publishers’ and funders’ policies. The responsibilities of the University and of Researchers are listed below.

Responsibilities of the University

The University will:

• Support the academic freedom of researchers to submit their work to the publication of their choice and support researchers to consider how best to make their work visible and accessible, including how best to enable the use of their work.
• Undertake advocacy and collaboration with publishers and other bodies, making efforts to influence the policies and practices of these groups, where possible, in support of this policy and the Warwick research community
• To provide a central OA service, currently WRAP, that helps authors to comply with relevant OA requirements, advise on how individual journals meet the contractual requirements of the various research funders, where appropriate and actively works to continue to reduce the administrative burden of OA policies on academics
• To assist researchers in depositing their publications into the institutional repository in a timely fashion and in accordance with funders’ requirements and respecting the copyright terms and conditions. This is done via the WRAP deposit form. The University will also update and curate the records of the papers in the repository, and manage any embargo periods, as appropriate
• To record the compliance of papers with funder policies, including the REF 2021 Open Access policy and apply exceptions to the policy where necessary for papers that are submitted through WRAP. The University will take responsibility for ensuring compliance if the paper is submitted through WRAP within the timeframe requirements imposed by the funders’ policies
• To ensure the long term preservation of publications in the repository and maintain the repository accordingly
• To advocate for OA to the academic community and communicate with them about OA requirements and the services offered by the University to help researchers comply
• To manage any block grants awarded to the University⁴ in an effective and responsible manner. As noted above the University recommends green OA as the most cost-effective way to achieve greater public access to scholarly outputs in the short-term and supports this through WRAP. Publication via the Gold open access route is supported through funds provided by the block grants to the University⁵
• To optimise publishing options available to researchers by investigating offsetting deals and signing up to these if they are deemed to be cost effective and in the researchers’ and University’s interest.
• To review the effectiveness of this policy, including, internally through reporting on compliance with funder mandates.

Responsibilities of researchers

Academics, researchers and graduate student researchers are required to:

• Inform the WRAP team with details of all of their scholarly outputs, including journal articles, conference papers, reports, books, book sections and chapters, patents and working and discussion papers. This information should include links to any relevant datasets and other research materials (where appropriate) and research funding grant details (where applicable).
• To meet the requirements of open access:
  • For all journal articles and conference papers, deposit a digital copy of the author accepted manuscript (AAM) in the WRAP service as soon as possible after the date of acceptance and no later than 3 months after this date (in accordance with the requirements of the REF2021 open access policy)
  • For all other types of scholarly output, Researchers are encouraged to deposit full versions with WRAP as soon as possible after the date of acceptance. This includes, but is not limited to, monographs, books, book chapters, reports, working papers, post-publication corrections and updates, video and audio representations. Where deposited WRAP will make them open access, wherever possible, in accordance with publisher policies and/or other contractual requirements
  • Ensure that their journal choice is compliant with their funders’ requirements. Researchers are encouraged to contact the Library for advice or use the SHERPA/FACT service
  • Ensure, especially where they have received open access funding, that their papers are published with the correct licence according to their funders’ requirements
  • Engage with the information, guidance and training offered by the University on OA issues
  • Ensure that open access publication costs are budgeted for in grants, where permitted, and to safeguard this money within the projects budget for this purpose. Researchers are encouraged to contact the Library or their research funder for advice
  • In order to optimise personal and institutional impact from their publications authors should follow the guidelines for publications as described in the University’s Publication Protocol (Annex A)

Additionally, research students are required to submit an electronic copy of their thesis following examination to be made available in WRAP in accordance with the instructions laid out in the Guide to Examinations for Higher Degrees by Research.

These responsibilities apply regardless of whether or not the Warwick researcher is the corresponding author or a co-author, but if a scholarly output has more than one Warwick author, it need only be deposited once.