Open Access Week 2022
Sherpa Romeo is an online resource that helps authors determine the copyright status of their published articles and open access archiving policies for journals around the world. If you are interested in uploading your published articles to the USF Scholarship Repository or making your research open access in other ways, you can search in Sherpa Romeo to determine if, how and when you are able to provide free access to your scholarly works.
Often, in publishing with a journal, an author relinquishes some of their personal copyright which impacts the ways in which the research can be reused. If you are considering creating an open access version of your scholarship (including posting your work in the USF Scholarship Repository), you can begin the process by searching in Sherpa Romeo the journal title, ISSN, or publisher name in which your work has been published or accepted. Sherpa Romeo has reviewed individual publishers’ self-archiving permissions and conditions of rights given to authors including a publication or publisher’s policies on OA fees, licenses, sharing, citations, embargoes, and open access. In Sherpa Romeo, publisher policies are explained as a set of pathways through which an article could become open access (depending on whether you plan to provide open access to the published, accepted, or submitted version of an article).
On a publisher’s summary page in Sherpa Romeo, you can determine through a number of icons whether a journal or publisher:
- Includes an option for open access publishing
- Requires a fee in order for a work to be published as open access
- Requires certain copyright ownership
- Requires other conditions to be met in order for a work to be published as open access
- Requires a license or licenses
- Requires prerequisites like funders, subjects, or permissions from the publisher
- Requests an embargo
As well as the details for any requirement. A journal page on Sherpa Romeo also provides information on additional notes that might apply to a particular policy.
Once you have located the correct publisher and have access to Sherpa Romeo’s summary of the Publisher Policy, click the plus icon on the right side of the screen corresponding to the version of the work you’re interested in re-publishing as open access (i.e. the “pathway”). This will reveal details on the specifications of the policy and the rules you must follow if open access is an option.
For how-to guides on the current version of Sherpa Romeo, check out Jisc’s video tutorials on navigating and using the site.
If you have questions about submitting your work to the USF Scholarship Repository, please consult the Scholarship Repository’s Frequently Asked Questions or contact Gleeson Library’s Open Education Librarian at repository@usfca.edu.