Open Access: Open Access Publishing Support

Many open access journals require authors pay an article processing charge (APC) which can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. The publisher's intent behind APCs is to recoup publishing costs.

Other important information:

• Not all journals charge APCs. We encourage you to seek out OA journals in your field that do not.
• Grant-funded research that requires public access allows APC fees to be paid for by the grant. You may need to include these costs at the time of submission.
• There are concerns about hybrid journals where publishers are perceived as--and most likely are--double-dipping by charging libraries subscription fees and authors publishing fees.  

Please note the OA Fund Application closed on December 31st, 2023 at 11:59pm. Applications will no longer be received. 

The University of Mississippi Libraries' Open Access Fund was originally created to raise aware of open access (OA) and to help off-set article processing charges, also known as APCs, associated with publishing in open access journals.

Over time, publishers have gradually adopted open access as a viable business strategy. By transitioning subscription costs into publishing support, libraries can offer researchers zero-cost open access publishing.

Starting in 2024, UM Libraries will use these agreements (read-and-publish, transformative) as the focal point to support researchers wanting to publish open access.

If you have questions, please contact Brian Young (bwyoung@olemiss.edu).

General notes:

• Eligibility will be determined by the corresponding author's institutional affiliation. In order to use these agreements, the corresponding author will need to be from the University of Mississippi. 
• If you are publishing in a journal not from these publishers, consult with your co-author (if applicable) to determine if their university has an agreement with the publisher of your journal.
• You can reach out to Brian Young (bwyoung@olemiss.edu) if you have any questions.

Elsevier (forthcoming January 1, 2025)

• Article processing charges (APCs) for 82 articles are covered annually on a first-come, first serve basis.
  • Does not include any journal that is already fully open access (known as gold OA journals)

Springer-Nature

• Article processing charges (APCs) are waived for hybrid open access journals published by Springer-Nature, including its affiliated imprint
• List of all journals covered (Excel file download)
  • Does not include Nature-branded titles, but will include Nature Academic titles
  • Does not include any journal that is already fully open access (known as gold OA journals)

Cambridge University Press (CUP)

• Article processing charges (APCs) are waived for almost all journals published by Cambridge University Press
  • As of 12/20/2023, the only exceptions are:
    • Africa Bibliography
    • Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales
    • Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales: English Edition
    • Behaviorial and Brain Sciences
    • PMLA / Publications of the Modern Language Association of America
    • New Surveys in the Classics
  • You can use CUP's checker tool to determine if a specific journal is covered.
  • You can also view pages 8-10 of this PDF for additional information.

Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)

• Article processing charges (APCs) are waived for all ACM journals.
• For additional information, you can view ACM's Open Author Rights Workflow.