Open Education Week - an annual event launched in 2012 by Open Education Global
Open Education Week, McMaster University Libraries, March 7-11, 2022
Open Education Week, McMaster University Libraries, March 1-5, 2021
Open Education Week, McMaster University Libraries, March 2-6, 2020
Open Education Week, McMaster University Libraries, March 4-8, 2019
Open Education Week, McMaster University Libraries, March 5-9, 2018
McMaster Library supports Open Access Publishing (OA) and is happy to assist faculty and students that are interested in making their work freely available.
The development of Open Access Publishing has seen the rise of predatory journals that seek to exploit the OA model. The primary goal of these journals is to make a profit by engaging in questionable editorial and publishing practices.
A Predatory Journal may:
Although outdated, the archived Beall's List of Potential Predatory Journals and Publishers is one resource for determining whether a publication is predatory.
Resources for Assessing Journals:
As of May 1st, 2015, open access is mandated by the Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications. Open access refers to scholarly research that is made freely available on the internet. In a scholarly environment, open access often focuses on journal articles.
Open access is a growing international movement that continues to gain momentum worldwide. Based on the principle that all research should be freely accessible online after publication, open access removes barriers that once restricted public access to scholarly research and knowledge.
The Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications has required all researchers funded by NSERC, SSHRC, or CIHR from May 1, 2015 to make their peer-reviewed journal articles freely available online within 12 months of publication.
The compliance requirements for health researchers have not changed, but CIHR-funded researchers must now refer to the Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications
Several funding agencies already mandate open access. Visit Sherpa Juliet, a database of research funders' open access policies, to learn more.
McMaster University Senate recently passed a motion to sign the Berlin Declaration encouraging McMaster researchers to make their work open access.
Open access journals make research freely available online to anyone with access to the internet.
It can provide immediate, public access to research funded by taxpayers.
Open access means greater dissemination of knowledge, a larger research impact, and potential for higher citation rates. Evidence for increased citations with open access can be found at the Open Access Citation Advantage Service website.
Altmetric tools such as ORCID, are available to help track your research impact with accuracy.
Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ): provides access to full text, quality controlled, scholarly open access journals in a variety of disciplines.
MacSphere: An online institutional repository of McMaster’s open access scholarly output.
OpenDOAR: A global directory of open access institutional or subject-based repositories
Yes. Many open access journals are peer-reviewed. Most self-archived articles have also been peer-reviewed.
Open access is free to users, but all publishing has a cost. A number of business models support open access publishing. Some open access journals charge a publishing fee to offset these costs.
Some open access journals charge authors a publishing fee. Many non-open access journals also make page or author charges in addition to subscription charges to readers. The Tri-Agency Open Access Policy identifies the cost of publishing as an eligible expense under the Use of Grant Funds
Use Sherpa Juliet to find more info about research funders’ open access policies
McMaster University does not offer grants for Author Processing Charges (APC). However, researchers at McMaster are currently eligible for some open access publishing discounts as a benefit of subscriptions paid for by the McMaster University Libraries. To learn more about the discounts, please see the "Library Support for Open Access" tab on the Open Access web page.
Funding Sources - Some granting agencies allow author costs as an eligible expense. Grant opportunities and their related policies can be accessed through the following websites:
To find out, use the Open Access Interactive Tool
Questions? Email scom@mcmaster.ca
Download and Customize for your Institution
Download the Open Access Interactive Tool and promotional video package
Open Access Interactive Tool, Outcome Documents, and Promotional Materials by McMaster University Libraries is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
What are the Publishers Copyright & Self Archiving Policies?
Sherpa Romeo - a database of publishers’ copyright and open access archiving policies from around the world
Wish to retain more control over copyright? Consider the SPARC Canadian Author Addendum:
Allows authors to retain select rights such as reproduction, reuse, and public presentation of their published articles for non-commercial purposes
Helps Canadian researchers comply with granting council public access policies, such as the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Policy on Access to Research Outputs
Reflects Canadian copyright law
Adapted from the SPARC Author Addendum
Alternatively use the wording in the template below (provided by the Government of Canada):
[Journal] acknowledges that the researcher will be entitled to archive an electronic copy of the final, peer-reviewed manuscript for inclusion in (name of repository). Manuscripts archived with (name of repository) may be made freely available to the public, via the internet, within twelve months of the official date of final publication in the journal.
More information about authors’ rights:
Open Access Overview (Peter Suber)
Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, 22 October 2003
Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI)
Open Access Curricula for Researchers & Library Schools (UNESCO)
Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC)
Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications
McMaster University researchers are entitled to discounts on Article Processing Charges (APCs) in the following journals or journal packages as a result of memberships negotiated and paid for by the Library. Identify yourself as affiliated with McMaster and the CRKN Consortium to receive the discounts. For more information about the CRKN agreements, see Open Access Publishing.
The Library provides funding to the following organizations to help support the open dissemination of content:
Our Library memberships support platforms, infrastructure, and open access initiatives more broadly.
For more information on journal publishing and library support, contact scom@mcmaster.ca
International Open Access Week - an annual event launched in 2008 by SPARC and partners in the student community
Open Access Week, McMaster University Libraries, October 25-31, 2021
Open Access Week, McMaster University Libraries, October 19-25, 2020
Open Access Week, McMaster University Libraries, October 21-27, 2019
Open Access Week, McMaster University Libraries, October 22-28, 2018
Open Access Week, McMaster University Libraries, October 23-27, 2017
