Approaches to Deposit Case Study: University of Sussex | opeNWorks

"The University of Sussex has 1200 staff, of which approximately 300 are exclusively research roles.  The annual research output (approximately 1300 papers) is stored in an EPrints repository, Sussex Research Online (SRO). The University is organised into 12 schools.  Operational decisions are often devolved to school level resulting in inconsistent policy implementation. The Library manages the institutional repository, prepared an institutional position on depositing to SRO and makes recommendations on Open Access to the University’s Research Committee.  The key current recommendation is for a new Open Access governance structure.  This aims to create a sense of university-wide ownership of the repository and would establish strategic and operational groups drawing membership from the Library, IT Services, the Research Office and the University Press and Communications department.  A user panel, made up of librarians and academic staff, is also recommended to ensure that all stakeholder groups can input into repository decisions and developments, and to encourage academic ownership.  Rather than a formal policy Sussex has an Open Access statement, which reflects HEFCE’s Open Access policy.  Adoption of the statement is at the discretion of individual schools and there is no centralised approach to Open Access implementation.  Schools have developed their own Open Access polices based on the University’s statement.  Schools are required to report on publications at termly meetings – some schools plan to consider only publications that are deposited in SRO.  The Library’s relationships with school administrators and training staff are critical in understanding Open Access activity across campus ..."