Open Access at Oxford » REF OA Policy Adjustment

"You may have spotted that last week HEFCE announced some adjustments in their Open Access policy (see http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/year/2015/CL,202015/). While a welcome move from HEFCE, it’s worth noting the adjustment does not significantly alter the scale or nature of the requirement. From 1st April 2016, there is still a requirement on researchers to act to deposit their manuscripts in a repository. Acceptance is the most natural and intuitive point at which to make this deposit. Any additional time allowed for deposit is only a temporary adjustment; the long-term requirement to act within 3 months of acceptance remains. This adjustment also now adds a requirement for UOAs to report on open access strategy and infrastructure as part of their Environment templates, which makes it in a department’s interest to be able to demonstrate the progress they are making to delivering open access from the outset of the policy. The University will provide further communications about HEFCE’s policy and what researchers need to do in Michaelmas Term, which will incorporate the relevant nuances of these adjustments ..."