Utah State UP joins library, will focus on OA

Patrick Williams, Utah State University Press Merges With Merrill-Cazier Library, Utah State Today, November 2, 2009.

Joining a growing national trend, Utah State University Press will merge with the administrative structure of Merrill-Cazier Library at Utah State University. The transition has begun, with the arrangement officially taking effect at the start of fiscal year 2010-11.

The move was recently approved by USU's Executive Vice President and Provost Raymond T. Coward, following a proposal from Richard Clement, dean of USU Libraries, and Michael Spooner, director of USU Press.

The merger of a scholarly press with a university library has been used at other institutions to innovatively address a number of trends in scholarly publication, Clement and Spooner said.

Digital publishing, for example, will play an important part in the future of scholarly publication, and university libraries and presses are both deeply interested in its potential for transforming the way research is distributed.

"Many university presses are moving toward open access, often under the administration of the library," Clement said. "The most conspicuous example in the recent past is the University of Michigan Press which moved into the library and is now focusing on OA and other forms of digital publication. We propose to move the USU Press along the same path." ...

"Among universities with presses, there is an emerging trend in this direction, and Utah State University Press now joins the first dozen or so university presses to pursue this relationship," Spooner said.

While the decision to move USU Press to Merrill-Cazier Library was not completely budget-driven, it will result in significant savings, Clement said. With a larger staff in place, the library will assume a number of support activities for the press, including accounting, IT support, graphic design and public relations. ...

USU Press will adopt a new publication model, with open access as a central component and will move toward increased digital delivery of books. ...

"This move directly serves the needs of the university," Clement said. "Open access allows us to go back to where university presses began — to publish work by all faculty in every discipline."

At the same time, USU Press remains a refereed scholarly press, with the standards of rigorous peer review appropriate to a university publisher. ...

For the last nine months, the survival of the Utah State University Press has been in doubt, with fears that deep cuts being made to public higher education in Utah would end up killing off the publishing outlet.

This week comes news that the press will survive -- in part by embracing a new model of organization (becoming part of the university library) and a new business model (embracing open access, in which most publications would be available online and free). ...