Skip to Search Skip to Navigation Skip to Content Skip to Footer
Winter Closure

Multiple Danforth campus libraries will be closed and inaccessible to patrons from December 21 until January 2. Read on for more details. 

Publishing Support

Jump to: WashU Libraries Open Access Publishing Agreements | Strategic Open Access Investments |
Alternate Funding Options | Services Not Offered

Over the last decade, libraries have become increasingly immersed in sharing academic publishing, not just content acquisition. With an emphasis on digital open access, Scholarly Communication & Digital Publishing Services contribute to ethical research and publishing practices at WashU by offering services and resources to support WashU researchers and students navigating different paths for sharing their research and teaching.

Scholarly Communication & Digital Publishing Services provides several services related to digital publishing and open access for the WashU community:

WashU Libraries Open Access Publishing Agreements

The WashU Libraries support Open Access (OA) publishing through agreements with publishers that provide discounts and waivers for publishing materials open access. Though the Libraries do not have a dedicated fund to help pay article processing charges, please see the Alternate Funding Options section for the other OA initiatives.

For those on the Danforth Campus, please contact Head of Scholarly Communication & Digital Publishing Services Micah Zeller (mdzeller@wustl.edu) with any questions regarding the Open Access Publishing Agreements with WashU Libraries.

For those on the Medical Campus, please contact Becker Medical Library Research Services Senior Librarian Cathy Sarli (sarlic@wustl.edu) for assistance with the Open Access Publishing Agreements with WashU Libraries.

For those with the WashU Brown School, please contact the Brown School Library Director Melissa Vetter (mvetter@wustl.edu) for assistance with the Open Access Publishing Agreements with WashU Libraries.

WashU Libraries has negotiated agreements with the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Open, Cambridge University Press, and Elsevier Journals. Please see the following sections for details.

ACM Open Agreement

WashU Libraries has negotiated a transformative open access agreement with the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) that covers publication for all journals, conference proceedings, and magazines of the world’s largest scientific and educational computing society.

Additionally, WashU-affiliated corresponding authors who publish with ACM retain copyright and publish open access (via CC BY license) at no cost to the author. WashU faculty, students, and staff continue to receive unlimited and unrestricted access to all content in the ACM Digital Library, and ACM will deposit all WashU co-authors into institutional repositories. For details, please see the ACM’s Transformative Model for Open Access Publication (ACM OPEN) website.

All submissions made between January 1, 2020, and December 31, 2025, are eligible. Authors who do not wish to publish Open Access may opt out and publish their work as subscription-only.

Authors must use their institutional email address to be routed to the ACM Open program.

  1. Upon the manuscript’s acceptance for publication, the corresponding author receives an email from the journal editor with a link to the ACM Open Author eRights platform.
  2. Authors select “Institutionally Paid Open Access / Permissions Release” from available rights offerings.
  3. Upon selecting the ACM Open OA option, authors are asked to select their Creative Commons (CC) license.
  4. After submitting their eRights forms, the author will receive an email confirmation of their acceptance along with a copy for their records.

Cambridge University Press Agreement

Through the Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA), WashU is party to a read-and-publish agreement with Cambridge University Press (CUP) that provides for Open Access (OA) publishing in available journals. Submissions must be made between January 1, 2023, and December 31, 2025.

With the agreement, WashU-affiliated corresponding authors are entitled to a full waiver of article processing charges for Research Articles, Rapid Communications, Review Articles, Brief Reports, and Case Reports (please see the CUP page for article type definitions).

See the CUP Open Access Waivers and Discounts page for a full list of eligible gold and hybrid OA titles (input the United States > Washington University in St. Louis for associated titles).

The corresponding author enters affiliation details (ideally using ORCID iD) when submitting to the Cambridge Core journal.

Upon acceptance, choose the Gold Open Access options in your author publishing agreement form and select a Creative Commons (CC) license. Check funder or institutional mandates for stipulations (e.g. CC-BY).

Follow instructions from RightsLink to coordinate the article processing charge transaction(s) and request funding (pre-paid by WashU as part of the agreement).

Learn more about Cambridge University Press journals that support Open Access publishing on the Cambridge University Press Publishing Open Access page.

Elsevier Journals Agreement

WashU Libraries has negotiated an agreement with Elsevier for open access publishing. WashU-affiliated corresponding authors are eligible for a full APC waiver (hybrid journals, including Cell Press), a 25% discount (Gold OA), and a 10% discount (Gold Cell Press and Lancet OA).

Waivers are fixed per calendar year and available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Articles must have a submission date between January 1, 2024, and December 31, 2027. Authors who have published under a subscription model in an eligible journal may notify Elsevier by January 31 of the following year to retroactively convert work to open access.

Search list of ~2,500 titles by name or subject area via the WashU Journal Finder List.

  1. Upon the journal editor’s acceptance of the manuscript for publication, the corresponding author receives an email with a link to the Elsevier Open Access Platform (EOAP).
  2. The Rights & Access form offers two license options: CC BY and CC BY-NC-ND.
  3. After validation of WashU affiliation, the author/institution is sent an invoice for a discounted article processing charge.
  4. Authors complete the “Publishing Journey” and submit information via the Online Author Communication System (OACS).
  5. The article is made publicly available on ScienceDirect within 24 hours.

Strategic Open Access Investments

The WashU Libraries, independently and in cooperation with consortial partners, has made strategic investments in external initiatives supporting open access infrastructure or publication of open access journals and books from reputable publishers.

  • Knowledge Unlatched | Knowledge Unlatched is an open access initiative that began as a funding mechanism to support open access book publication by university presses or other academic publishers.
  • MIT Press Direct to Open | WashU Libraries pledged support for MIT’s D2O program, which will open MIT’s complete list of scholarly books published in 2022, or about 90 books. If D2O support goals are reached, supporting libraries will also receive access to MIT’s backfile of about 2300 titles.
  • DOAJ | As part of the Greater Western Academic Library Alliance, WashU Libraries are a 2023 sustaining member of the Directory of Open Access Journals.

Alternate Funding Options

Please see the following for alternative funding options available through WashU and a decision flowchart to ensure all options are being checked.

Article Processing Charge Flowchart

Article Processing Charge (APC) Flowchart.
Select the image for a larger version or review a PDF version of the Article Processing Charge Flowchart.

Please use the Journal Checker Tool to help determine the options supported by other funders’ open access policies; this tool does not include federal funders.

Services Not Offered

There are some services Scholarly Communication & Digital Publishing Services are unable to offer. We cannot:

  • Provide funds for payment of APCs for open access publications that are not part of an existing negotiated agreement.
  • Create and populate your digital publication with your content.
  • Host boutique or open-ended digital projects outside our service scope and policies.

To learn about available services or request a consultation, please email Scholarly Communication & Digital Publishing Services at digital@wumail.wustl.edu.