There is much good news to share about our collections in our first newsletter being sent to faculty, lecturers, adjuncts, and administrators. There are also some important reminders about our services.
As you read through this newsletter, you will note that Transformative Agreements are happening everywhere. Academic libraries can no longer afford the annual inflationary costs for subscriptions. As subscriptions have declined, publishers are moving various collections to Open Access (Gold and Hybrid) but are also charging authors article processing charges (APC). When possible, libraries negotiate limited or unlimited APC as part of their contracts with the publishers. As the workflows are being set up here at UIS, I ask for your patience. Some have been established, and others are in development, but as a university, system, and consortia member library, UIS Library is expanding access while trimming costs. I am happy to answer questions about these new agreements, and I look forward to scheduling informational sessions for faculty.
A quick reminder about the services offered for faculty, adjuncts, and lecturers. Under the “Resources” drop-down menu on the Library's website is a guide explaining Library Services for Faculty. This page has information for everything you need to request instruction or custom-built Research Guides, set up Course Reserves, or request books and streaming media. Contact information for our staff can be found under the "About" drop-down menu or you can use the library's Q&A system, and inquiries will be directed to the right person.
State Grant Funding for Open Educational Resources (OER)
Thanks to the advocacy of various groups, the FY 2024 Illinois state budget, for the first time, specifically included monies for academic libraries and specified the funding is for the use of Open Educational Resources. The $3 Million in grants will be part of grant funding managed by the Illinois State Library, a department within the Secretary of State's Office. At the time of this newsletter, the application has not yet been released. However, monies need to be awarded and distributed by June 30, 2024, and expended by June 30, 2026. Grants can be used for textbook creation, ancillary materials such as homework and quizzes for current OER textbooks, education and training, and much more. Watch for further announcements about this grant funding in the coming weeks.
Expanded Access to JSTOR at UIS
JSTOR’s mission is to expand and enhance access to knowledge and education for people worldwide. As a nonprofit, their policies and decisions aim to maximize impact, not revenue or profit. They offered a new fee model to maximize access and control inflationary costs, and the UIS Library opted to change our subscription model. Instead of paying for a few selected JSTOR modules, UIS students, faculty, and staff will have access to ALL licensed JSTOR archival journals and primary sources.
The benefits of the new model for current JSTOR participants:
- UIS Library gains immediate access to all archival journals and primary source content on JSTOR that is available for licensed access.
- Full access begins on January 1, 2024.
- The new subscription model expands access while increasing annual fees modestly to cover JSTOR's costs, ensuring inflationary stability for subscribers.
Transformative Agreement with Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) at U
Starting in January 2024, Brookens Library transitioned from a membership model with subscription fees to the ACM Open model. ACM plans to transition wholly to a full Open Access publisher by 2026, and UIS could see a slight reduction in inflationary costs in their renewals at that time.
Key benefits include:
- Unlimited OA publishing for all corresponding authors across ACM's catalog of magazines, conference proceedings, and journals.
- Unlimited access to full-text subscription contents of the ACM Digital Library.
- Automatic deposit upon publication of all accepted research articles into an institutional repository.
- Default CC-BY author rights on all accepted research articles.
UI Libraries' EBook agreement with Taylor & Francis
The University of Illinois system libraries have negotiated a Taylor & Francis Evidence Base Acquisition (EBA) purchasing program for ebooks in the Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS).
This agreement for UIUC, UIC, and UIS started incorporating ebooks for HSS titles January 1, 2024, and includes a 15-year backfile. Ebook records for over 66,000 titles from Taylor & Francis' imprints will be available in the UIS library catalog. While most (94%) will be Routledge titles, titles from many other T&F imprints are included, including Auerbach, Birkbeck Law, CRC, Eye on Education, Gower, Informa Law from Routledge, Productivity Press, Psychology Press, RFF Press, Taylor & Francis, and Willan.
At the end of each calendar year, the three participating libraries can decide which items to purchase using the evidence from the year's usage to inform decision-making.
U of I System Transformative Agreement with Elsevier
At the November 2023 meeting, the University of Illinois Board of Trustees approved the University of Illinois' Libraries renewal of the Elsevier license for Science Direct, starting January 2024 and serving the University of Illinois System for five years. While contractual agreement and approval are usual actions, the license is a significant departure from the previous agreement in several key ways:
- Price Increases: the annual increase negotiated on the contract is 0.55% lower per year than the past contract. That represents a significant savings over the life of the contract.
- Content: the contract includes all of the same post-cancellation access rights, maintains all of the same title lists, and ensures that our scholars maintain the high level of direct access that they previously indicated they value.
- Open Access Components: the contract includes several components that enhance our ongoing efforts to ensure that scholarship from Illinois authors reaches the broadest possible audience. In addition to a 15% discount on article processing charges (APCs) for accepted articles published in Elsevier's Gold OA titles, the contract includes a provision to cover Open Access publishing in Elsevier's Core-Hybrid titles without paying any additional APC. Authors will have the opportunity to opt-in to take advantage of these credits starting with papers accepted after January 1, 2024, and they will be available to be used on a first-come, first-served basis. More details are available upon request for UIS faculty curious about or intending to publish in Elsevier journals. Please contact University Librarian Pattie Piotrowski for more information.
If OA publishing rates remain the same, UI Libraries project that this agreement will save the University nearly $1,000,000 in APCs. If the OA publishing rate rises to utilize the full value of the APC credits and publishing continues apace with Gold OA publishing, we project a value in excess of $12,000,000 in potentially avoided APC costs.
About CARLI
The Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI) began operating on July 1, 2005 to improve the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of services, increase the effectiveness of consortial and member library efforts, and create opportunities to pursue new programs and services. CARLI products, services, and programs now include:
- I-Share, a shared catalog of 90 institutions with 38 million unique items
- Digital Collections
- Electronic Resources, including databases and ebooks
- Collections Management
- Public Services and Professional Development
- OER Commons and Illinois SCOERS
- Delivery of Physical Materials
CARLI Provides Free Access to All U of I Press Online Journals
On July 1, 2023, CARLI began a five-year pilot program to provide all University of Illinois Press (UIP) electronic journals to all CARLI members. The FY24-FY28 pilot is funded by the University of Illinois System as the result of a joint request from the UIP and CARLI in FY22. The journals are available and searchable in I-Share. UIP also publishes a browsable list of individual titles.
CARLI Continues Consortial EBook Access to Wiley and Oxford
As of July 2023, as a CARLI Governing Member, UIS has full-text access to all subject areas for Wiley Online Books added to the Wiley Online Library platform from 2019 through June 2024. All titles have unlimited access for CARLI members through June 30, 2024, and may be used as course materials or for course reserves. Direct links may be embedded into course management systems. New online books will be added to the Wiley Online Library monthly through the end of our access period on June 30, 2024.
As of July 2023, as a CARLI Governing Member, UIS has full-text access to ebooks added to the Oxford Scholarship Online/Oxford Academic platform from January 2019 - March 2024 in six subject collections: Biology, History, Law, Music, Political Science, and Religion. All titles have unlimited access for CARLI members through June 30, 2024, and may be used for course materials or course reserves. Direct links may be embedded into course management systems. New ebooks will be added to these subject collections on Oxford Scholarship Online monthly through the end of our access period in March 2024.
July-August 2024, CARLI will purchase ebooks from Wiley and Oxford University Press based on consortial usage data. CARLI Governing Members may also purchase titles from these publishers through June 30, 2024, at the rate negotiated for the CARLI agreement with titles for consortial access.
Waiving Open Access Publishing Fees for CARLI Authors in Wiley Journals
CARLI is pleased to announce a five-year, consortial open access agreement with Wiley that waives article processing charges (APC) for open access publishing in Wiley's hybrid and open access journals for manuscripts submitted by authors at subscribing institutions.
This Transformative Agreement provides unlimited electronic access to all Wiley journals along with no-fee open access publishing for authors from subscribing CARLI institutions. There will be no additional charges for subscribing institutions beyond the typical annual increase. Subscribing institutions will share an annual pool of 39 OA article entitlements to be used annually on a first-come, first-served basis. CARLI membership includes 128 institutions in Illinois. Authors publish articles at no charge to them under a free-to-read Creative Commons license.
VIP: For Wiley journals, manuscripts accepted for publication between January 1, 2024, and December 31, 2028, are eligible. CARLI staff, in coordination with subscribing libraries, will approve accepted articles and adapt new workflows that are still being developed at the time of this writing. The workflow for authors varies depending on the type of journal – hybrid or open access (gold).
CARLI Illinois Support for Creation of Open Educational Resources (SCOERS)
The Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) in the U.S. Department of Education initially awarded a $1.08 million grant to the University of Illinois System/CARLI for Illinois SCOERs (Support for Creation of Open Educational Resources). Illinois SCOERs activities began on September 1, 2021, and extends to August 31, 2024. In May 2022, CARLI was notified that approximately $1 million in additional funds would be awarded in calendar year 2022 from FIPSE and the Open Textbooks Pilot grant developed by CARLI. Currently, there are three available OER textbooks, including one by a UIS faculty member, that were in use and assessed during Fall 2023:
The Psychology of Exceptional Children
Dr. Diana Zaleski, Social Science, CC-BY 4.0
University of Illinois Springfield
https://carli.commons.libretexts.org/book/socialsci-176688
Caregiving for the Human Condition - An OER for Nursing Assistant Instruction
Lari Labello and Jessica Blackmore, Medicine, CC-BY 4.0
Illinois Central College
https://carli.commons.libretexts.org/book/med-80625
General, Organic, and Biochemistry with Problems, Case Studies, and Activities
Chemistry, CC-BY-SA 4.0
Harper College
https://carli.commons.libretexts.org/book/chem-435628
Additional titles still to be published in 2024 by SCOERS include:
- Psychology 201
- Essentials of Pharmacology
- Principals of Marketing for Transformation
- Cultural Humility in Public Administration
- An Introduction to Human Nutrition
- Principles of Management and Leadership
- Fundamental Anatomy and Psychology for Health
- A Diverse Approach to Understanding Language Development in Children
- The OER Guide to Media Writing
Thank you for your time and attention,
Pattie Piotrowski