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Open Access for ACU Research Policy

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Section 1 - Purpose

(1) The purpose is to:

  1. outline Open Access mechanisms used at ACU to facilitate the widest possible availability, dissemination and reuse of ACU research by other researchers nationally and internationally, and by the wider community;
  2. implement requirements of the ARC Open Access Policy and the NHMRC Open Access Policy;
  3. adhere to the Australian Deputy Vice-Chancellors (Research) Committee mandated Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable (F.A.I.R) Statement (Policy Statement on F.A.I.R. Access to Australia's Research Outputs); and
  4. allow the University to adhere to open access policies of state, national and international granting bodies and to support the global infrastructure of open access research.
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Section 2 - Scope / Application

(2) This Policy applies to ACU staff and higher degree research students. It also applies to all University affiliates (visiting academics, academic title holders, emeritus professors, adjunct and honorary title holders, and conjoint appointments), where an ACU attribution is appropriate in the publication in question.

(3) The policy applies to research outputs intended for publication, for the purpose of conferring a higher degree or for academic recognition and impact. It does not apply to social media communications, commercially funded research outputs or which contain culturally sensitive or confidential material.

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Section 3 - Policy Statement and Principles

(4) ACU is committed to the dissemination of research outputs in a timely and easily accessible way that fosters intellectual, social, economic, cultural and environmental benefits and promotes the development of key capacities of the human person.

(5) ACU is committed to the highest standards of excellence, impact and engagement in research practice, including support for effective and appropriate review processes and reproducibility.

(6) ACU supports a diversity of financially sustainable, transparent and trusted dissemination models of open access in recognition of disciplinary differences.

(7) ACU supports approaches that encourage collaboration and the transfer of knowledge between researchers and users of research in industry, government and the general community.

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Section 4 - Roles and Responsibilities

(8) For management and compliance in relation to open access, the following responsibilities are in place:

Authors and researchers
obtain and retain all necessary rights where possible to enable the authorisation of publication and re-use in any format at any time;

ensure permission has been obtained from the copyright holder for the use and open display of all third party copyrighted material in their publications;

deposit the open access version of refereed research articles and published conference papers to ACU’s institutional research repository service (ACU Research Bank) immediately upon receipt of a Digital Object Identifier or acceptance for publication (where a DOI is not issued) Where a publication has more than one ACU author, the first named ACU author is required to take responsibility for ensuring this policy is met;

retain the right to disseminate a full-text version of peer reviewed articles immediately on publication, and where not possible, no later than 12 months from the date of first publication or in compliance with any embargoes applied by a publisher;

obtain external co-author consent to deposit in the ACU Research Bank where possible;
secure where possible the immediate unrestricted access to publication content through a range of different strategies, either via a publisher’s website or an institutional or other acceptable public repository;

make research data directly related to research publications as open as possible while complying with the Australian Government Public Policy Statement and the Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research;

where possible apply Creative Commons licences and utilise international metadata standards to research outputs to ensure accessibility, interoperability and reusability.
Higher degree research students ensure permission has been obtained from the copyright holder for the use and open display of all third party copyrighted material in their thesis;

submission of final thesis to the ACU Research Bank upon conclusion of the examination process, using the established process;

apply Creative Commons licences and utilise international metadata standards to research outputs to ensure accessibility, interoperability and reusability.
Library Director Report annually to the Vice-Chancellor's Advisory Committee on:
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research and Enterprise) strategic oversight of higher degree research, and responsibility for issuing guidance regarding policy compliance.
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Section 5 - Review

(9) ACU may amend this Policy from time to time and review at least every 5 years, or when there are significant changes in Australian or international legal frameworks for Intellectual Property and related legislation, and / or to improve the effectiveness of its operation.

(10) An ACU staff member or student who wishes to make any comments about this Policy may forward their suggestions to the Responsible Officer.

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Section 6 - Revision made to this Policy

(11) Unless otherwise indicated, this Policy will still apply beyond the review date.

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Section 7 - Further Assistance

(12) Any staff member who requires assistance in understanding this Policy should first consult their nominated supervisor who is responsible for the implementation and operation of these arrangements in their work area. Should further advice be required staff should contact the Copyright Manager, copyright.officer@acu.edu.au.

(13) Any students who require assistance in understanding this Policy should first consult a teacher within their academic program. Should further advice be required students should approach the Library https://library.acu.edu.au/help/contact-us.

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Section 8 - Definitions

(14) For the purpose of this Policy:

Term Definition
Appropriate version Means either works under a creative commons licence or an accepted manuscript.
Creative Commons licenses From https://creativecommons.org/ Internationally recognised licensing system which has 4 conditions. ACU recommends a CC BY NC for most research works.
  • Attribution (CC BY)
  • Attribution ShareAlike (CC BY-SA)
  • Attribution-NoDerivs (CC BY-ND)
  • Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC)
  • Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA)
  • Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND)
Embargo in academic publishing is a period of time during which access to a specific version of the work is restricted by the publisher. For example, access to the author’s accepted manuscript may be restricted for a period of six months from the date of first publication.
Open Access Open Access For scholarly work Open Access means making all scholarly outputs freely available via the Internet, permitting any user to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full text of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any lawful purpose, without financial, legal or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. (https://oaaustralasia.org/)
Thesis means a substantive work as submitted for examination for the award of a higher degree by research and as defined in Higher degree research candidates.
Research Outputs
Research Outputs include:
1. Verified research publications as defined by the Research publication policy which include:
  • Books
  • Book chapter
  • Journal articles
  • Conference publications
  • Non-traditional research outputs which comprise of creative works, exhibitions, scholarly reports
2. Curated-de-identified research datasets.
See the Research Publication Policy