Empowering early career humanities researchers to successfully navigate the scholarly publishing process

Abstract

This case report illustrates how a scholarly communication librarian partnered with a humanities subject librarian and others to address knowledge gaps that graduate students and early career researchers at a large public research institution have about the scholarly publishing landscape. To address frequently asked questions the organizers identified from their individual experiences working with researchers, they chose a panel format where each speaker responded to a common scenario posed by a moderator. The webinar was recorded and shared internally on various sites as a reference. Feedback indicated the webinar was informative and helpful, and organizers plan to use it as a blueprint for future webinars or videos on specific topics about scholarly publishing.

Keywords:

• Scholarly publishing
• scholarly communication
• graduate students
• open access
• humanities

Introduction

When Johanna Meetz first joined The Ohio State University (OSU) Libraries as the Publishing and Repository Services Librarian, she proactively met with disciplinary cohorts of subject librarians to share more about her job responsibilities and learn about how they interacted with their constituents about scholarly publishing, open access, and sharing publications in the institutional repository. Johanna’s previous role was Scholarly Communication and Publishing Services Librarian at Pacific University. Jennifer Schnabel, English Librarian and liaison to the Department of Linguistics and to the Film Studies program, then asked if Johanna would like to partner with her to create either an event or a tool to educate graduate students about the scholarly publishing process, including journal submission protocols, open access options, authors agreements, peer reviewer feedback, and revision timelines.

Jennifer’s collaboration request was in response to an identified need to fill knowledge gaps, especially for graduate students. In January 2020, she was invited to visit a Writing for Publication graduate seminar, where the students were using Wendy Laura Belcher’s book, Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks: A Guide to Academic Publishing Success (2019), to help them revise a course paper from a previous semester and submit to a journal for publication. She asked Maria Scheid, then Copyright Services Coordinator, to join her. The students and the professor, an experienced humanities researcher, all expressed appreciation for tips on how to investigate potential outlets for their work, options for publishing open access, fair use, copyright ownership, and negotiable parts of an author agreement. When Jennifer met with Johanna, they discussed ways they might work together—along with Copyright Services—to address humanities graduate students’ gaps in understanding of the scholarly publishing process, including journal submission protocols, open access options, authors agreements, peer reviewer feedback, and revision timelines.

During Jennifer and Maria’s presentation to the class, Jennifer focused on draft revision and reflection questions, citation tracing practices, and journal identification and evaluation methods. Maria talked about the default rights given to authors under U.S. copyright law, copyright ownership under the university’s intellectual property policy, and common terms found in publishing agreements. Maria also discussed the possible impact of certain publishing terms on an author’s use of their scholarship and shared resources for better understanding and negotiating publishing agreements. At the end of the session, the students said they felt more prepared to turn one of their course papers into a journal article. The professor shared that although she had published in many journals during her long career, she hardly ever read her author agreements and wasn’t clear about her rights as copyright holder. She wished she had known more earlier in her career. This experience, along with anecdotal evidence from Maria about questions she often received from humanities researchers about copyright issues, reminded Jennifer that graduate students in her liaison areas would benefit from a more strategic introduction to the scholarly publishing process. She also recalled the conclusion she and her coauthors reached in their 2020 study about graduate student needs: discipline-specific outreach was more effective than multi-disciplinary orientations to address gaps in research knowledge. Jennifer reached out to the Head of Graduate Studies in the English Department to confirm that graduate students in her primary area would be interested in a workshop on the topic, and they responded positively.

Jennifer shared this experience with Johanna and then suggested they invited Maria to join them in planning an event and contribute her copyright expertise. Jennifer had also recently met Ana Maria Jimenez-Moreno, Acquisitions Editor for Literary and Cultural Studies at The Ohio State University Press, and asked her if she would be interested in participating to share her perspective of the publishing process. Ana frequently talks to individual researchers about the scholarly publishing process and what to expect as an author in addition to discussing potential fit between the Press and the monograph topic. We knew graduate students in particular would benefit from Ana’s experience as an editor and her interest in demystifying the process once a monograph proposal is accepted, so we invited her to join our panel as well.

Literature review

Academic librarians have long recognized a need for tailored information literacy and research skills instruction for graduate students across disciplines as they transition from undergraduate researchers to professional scholars (Fleming-May & Yuro, 2009; Ince et al., 2019). Numerous colleagues in our profession have shared their strategies for supporting these early career researchers, many of whom may be underprepared for and anxious about publishing in their field (Young & Jacobs, 2013). For example, librarians at Georgia Institute of Technology discussed the success of their Graduate Library User Education series (Critz et al., 2012), librarians at Illinois State University collaborated with other units across campus, including the Graduate School, to develop the Graduate School Professional Development Series (Franzen et al., 2018) and librarians at Polytechnique Montréal published their survey of a long-running, mandatory information literacy course (Basque et al., 2020).

In addition to honing their research skills and understanding how to navigate the scholarly communication landscape for their work, graduate students in many fields are encouraged and often required to publish scholarly articles while progressing in their programs in preparation for a competitive job market (Clark, 2020); many also feel pressure to turn their dissertations into scholarly monographs after graduation (Shirazi, 2018). Librarians are becoming increasingly integral in educating these early-career researchers about the scholarly publishing process, including interpreting authors rights, selecting open access journals, navigating copyright and permissions, and evaluating publisher quality and legitimacy (Berger, 2023; Buitrago Ciro & Hernández-Pérez, 2023). Though academic departments and advisors may suggest specific journals or publishers for students to investigate, and several resources exist to help students think about writing for publication (Casanave & Vandrick, 2003; Belcher, 2019), often there is a knowledge gap about the scholarly communication landscape, especially the publishing process (O’Hara et al., 2019; Tella & Onyancha, 2021). As Stuit and Caldwell observe from the interviews they conducted with graduate students, “learning about publishing is a slow, unequal, compartmentalized, and non-transparent process that is an emotional experience” (2023). Other researchers note challenges graduate students face when navigating the “informal curriculum” of publication and that they often receive “uneven education and training in this skill” (Woodend et al., 2024). A published study on graduate student information literacy and research support needs from Rutgers University librarians show that “publishing tips” rank high on the list of graduate students requested topics for workshops (Fong et al., 2016). The results of a recently published study of graduate student needs and learning preferences around scholarly communication at the University of Calgary highlight “how to choose a publication venue, how peer review works, what is a predatory publisher, and how to understand publication metrics," and the authors assert that librarians can provide complementary support to the mentorship students already receive in their departments (Hurrell et al., 2024).

Examples from the past decade of library literature about the successes and challenges involved in designing coordinated initiatives to inform graduate students about the scholarly communication process include a Publishing Academy at the University of Louisville (McClellan et al., 2017) as well as the revised online version (Grote et al., 2023); a mandatory online module at Hong Kong Baptist University (Chan, 2019); a publishing toolkit created by a Florida Gulf Coast University librarian and a Taylor & Francis Group Library Manager (Donlan & Sieck, 2016); and a collaborative workshop series and accompanying online toolkit at the University of Michigan Library (Alverez et. al, 2014). Of course, as information literacy and research support needs of graduate students vary across disciplines, knowledge gaps cannot always be addressed with a one-size-fits-all approach to library outreach and education (Bussell et al., 2020). Discipline-specific programming, such as the University of Western Ontario library’s workshops for engineering, health sciences, medicine & dentistry, and science students (Hoffmann et al., 2008), Des Moines University Library’s summer institute on research and scholarly communication for medical and health sciences students (Schlesselman-Tarango et al., 2023), can help librarians focus on the educating graduate students on the latest publishing practices in their field.

At OSU, librarians and library staff members consistently receive inquiries from researchers about the scholarly publishing process. Questions range from how to use third party materials such as images in their work to interpreting an author agreement around copyright ownership and options for making research free and open. Librarians are sometimes invited to graduate seminars or faculty meetings to share information about a particular aspect of scholarly publishing, and online and in-person events about copyright and open access publishing are held regularly. Researchers often approach library staff when they are confused by a question from a publisher or receive an e-mail about open access choices as part of institutional transformative publishing agreements.¹ This is especially true for humanities researchers, many of whom do not receive grant funding to cover author processing charges (APCs) to ensure their work is published open access (Cantrell & Swanson, 2020). The current literature, as well as the authors’ anecdotal experience working with students and researchers, signaled an opportunity to provide a resource created specifically with early career humanities researchers in mind that they could access at their point of need.

Methods

To make our work as accessible, impactful, and efficient as possible, we chose to plan a virtual event that we could record so that it could be shared with anyone who couldn’t attend as well as be available to people who might be interested in the future. Our presentation was held in partnership with the Libraries’ Research Commons, which frequently help organize and promote events like ours. The presentation was held in the spring of 2022; 65 people registered and 31 attended.

The target audience of this event was graduate students and early career faculty in humanities departments. We chose graduate students to be our primary audience because they are uniquely positioned in the University structure; they can share what they know with undergraduates as well as with faculty. We aimed for humanities graduate students, since open access has been adopted more slowly in these fields (Gross & Ryan, 2015). In addition, in our experience, there seems to be a perception among graduate students, and even among early career faculty members, that they should know all about publishing—though most do not. We wanted to normalize the idea that no one, not even experienced faculty members, knows everything about publishing and never needs to reach out to other experts for help.

We planned to structure our presentation like a panel, where the moderator, subject librarian Jennifer Schnabel, asked questions of the rest of the participants. Panelists were Johanna Meetz, Publishing and Repository Services (PRS) Librarian, Maria Scheid, Copyright Services Coordinator (now Head of Copyright Services), and Ana Maria Jimenez-Moreno, Acquisitions Editor for Literary and Cultural Studies at The Ohio State University Press. The questions were those commonly asked by graduate students in relevant subject areas, and each panelist planned to weigh in as appropriate to their areas of expertise. The questions themselves were formulated like scenarios to set a conversational tone and encourage those listening to feel free to ask questions. They were:

1. How do you turn a course paper, parts of your dissertation, or conference paper into a journal article?

2. Would what you need to do propose an edited collection or special issue of a journal?

3. How do you turn your dissertation or other research into a monograph?

4. What other kinds of publication might you consider and what additional things should be considered when publishing non-traditionally?

Brief summary of panel discussion

Jennifer introduced the panelists and their professional roles and affiliations, then shared the group’s reasoning for planning the event and structuring it with scenarios early career researchers in the humanities likely encounter. She transitioned to the discussion by asking panelists to share general advice about scholarly publishing. The highlighted points shared were:

• Maria (Copyright Services Coordinator): Read your [author] agreements and make sure that you understand those terms before you sign them.

• Johanna (PRS Librarian): Think about the audience that you would like to reach first because that influences where you submit your work for publication. Once you’ve selected a journal, you can look at their policies and requirements for submission and write with those in mind.

• Ana (Acquisitions Editor): Get a mentor to help you make informed decisions about publication options and writing a proposal.

Jennifer then asked the first question, “How do you turn a course paper, parts of your dissertation, or conference paper into a journal article?” Johanna talked about where to get ideas for papers to publish, how to choose an appropriate journal, and how to evaluate open access journals. She encouraged audience members to read submission guidelines carefully, send query letters to editors, and understand editor and peer reviewer feedback on submissions. Maria outlined the aspects of standard publication agreements and which elements, like transfer of copyright, might be negotiable. She urged authors to consider how they would use, and would want others to use, their work now and in the future.

The next question, “Would what you need to do propose an edited collection or special issue of a journal?,” was first posed to Ana, who emphasized that cohesion and a purposeful argument, not just a theme, made for a successful proposal. She talked about the project management and diplomacy involved in bringing a group of authors and their essays together. Then, Johanna talked about how special issues of journals focused on specific topics and recommended that researchers reach out to the editors if they had questions about the submission guidelines, which may vary from the standard guidelines of the journal.

The third question, “How do you turn your dissertation or other research into a monograph?,” prompted Ana to reflect on a commonly asked question she receives about whether university presses publish dissertations. She shared that yes, many scholarly monographs are derived from dissertations, but the work should undergo substantial revisions with purposeful consideration of audience. Ana went on to discuss the book proposal process and then how an accepted manuscript moves through the editorial process, including book design, and then marketing. She added that an author agreement for a monograph will likely include language about using third-party material, like images, and suggested researchers consider if they can make a strong case for fair use or if permission is needed from the copyright owners as well as consider any cost associated with obtaining permission. Ana then talked about open access publishing options for monographs, including subvention programs funded by universities.

The final question, “What other kinds of publication might you consider and what additional things should be considered when publishing non-traditionally?” was first answered by Maria, who reminded the audience that copyright exists regardless of platforms and that authors own their work even if the format is different than a traditional journal article or monograph. Ana outlined resources, and Johanna touched on accessibility and preservation considerations.

Lastly, we thanked everyone for attending, invited further questions via email, and shared a handout with our contact information in the chat. After the presentation, we sought and received feedback from those who attended the session via a standard survey sent out by the Research Commons. Registrants also received the recording of the webinar. In addition, in late 2022 and early 2023, we sent out a survey to graduate students and early career faculty in humanities departments, including English, History, Art History, Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies, Philosophy, and Linguistics. We asked them to view the recording of the presentation, then answer a short survey about its helpfulness.

Results

The responses from the survey sent out immediately after the presentation to attendees were positive, with two participants saying they were extremely likely to recommend the session to others, and the other five respondents saying they were somewhat likely to recommend the session. In addition, three of the attendees who responded to the survey indicated they were extremely satisfied with the content, and five of them were extremely satisfied with the presenters.

In the second survey we sent out in late 2022-early 2023, we asked for additional feedback from new viewers of the recording of our panel, including graduate students and early career faculty. We obtained approval from OSU’s Institutional Review Board and worked with our Assessment Coordinator to obtain email addresses of graduate students in the six humanities departments with the most enrolled students. Out of 173 graduate students and 12 tenure-track faculty members, 6 graduate students completed the survey, and their feedback is summarized below.

Four of the six students indicated that their understanding of scholarly publishing on a scale of 1-5 was a “3” (Figure 1).

Figure 1. The distribution of answers to the question, “On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with scholarly publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?”.

Half of the students indicated that their familiarity with journal publishing on a scale of 1-5 was a “3” and two rated their understanding a “4” (Figure 2).

Figure 2. The distribution of answers to the question, “On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with journal publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?”.

Note: One student seems to have skipped this question. Four students reported they had 4/5 familiarity with open access, which is interesting, since this isn’t reflected in our experiences answering questions or consulting with graduate students about open access (Figure 3).

Figure 3. The distribution of answers to the question, “On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with Open Access (OA) where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?”.

Four students reported most of their questions were answered, and the remaining two said some questions were answered.

In addition, the answers from question one where participants were asked to rate their familiarity with scholarly publishing on a scale from 1-5, and the answers to the question where participants were asked if the topics covered in the video address their gaps in knowledge can be compared (Figure 4).

Figure 4. The distribution of answers to the question, “Do the topics covered in the video address gaps in knowledge you may have had about scholarly publishing?”.

Four of the five respondents who ranked their initial understanding of scholarly publishing as a three or four had most of their questions answered. The person who rated their understanding of scholarly publishing as two had some questions answered (Tables 1 and 2).

Table 1. Comparison of answers to questions “On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with scholarly publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?” and “Do the topics covered in the video address gaps in knowledge you may have had about scholarly publishing?”.

On a scale of 1–5, how would you rate your familiarity with scholarly publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?	Do the topics covered in the video address gaps in knowledge you may have had about scholarly publishing?
2	Yes, some of my questions were answered
3	Yes, some of my questions were answered
3	Yes, most of my questions were answered
3	Yes, most of my questions were answered
4	Yes, most of my questions were answered

Table 2. Ranking of preferences for additional topics that may be covered in future presentations.

Additional topics for future presentations from most to least requested

Pros and cons of publishing your work open access

Understanding and/or negotiating author agreements

How to publish your thesis/dissertation

Book publishing process

The article publishing process

Identifying resources for help/where to go for help

Predatory publishing

Including another person’s material in your publication (such as an image)

Lastly, we asked about additional topics that might be covered in future presentations and asked students to rank them.

Discussion

In the survey, the students indicated that they have about an average familiarity with scholarly publishing and are neither beginners nor experts. Furthermore, they expressed more confidence when asked about journal publishing and a greater familiarity with open access in general. Overall, students shared that some or most of their questions were answered by our presentation. In the future, they would like to learn more about the pros and cons of publishing their work open access, how to understand and/or negotiate author agreements, and how to publish a thesis or dissertation.

Creating and giving this presentation and coming together as this set of collaborators has been impactful to our work as individuals. The public services librarians at The Ohio State University have not collaborated extensively with the University Press or worked across our own departments regularly to give presentations on scholarly communication in specific disciplines. For Jennifer (English subject librarian), this has meant yet another opportunity to connect her constituents to people and resources to help them navigate the complex scholarly communication landscape. For Johanna, (Publishing and Repository Services Librarian), this has created stronger connections with colleagues, allowed for practical discussion, and given insight into the perspectives of those graduate students and early career researchers who attended. As a result of what she’s learned, she looks forward to revising her LibGuide on the publishing process as well as thinking about how she might share information about the publishing process in consultations with graduate students and faculty. For Maria, now Head of Copyright Services, it has meant reaching new audiences and the opportunity to discuss copyright in a more holistic and practical way. This pragmatic approach to copyright outreach and education makes the law more approachable and predictable for authors. Lastly, for Ana (Literary and Cultural Studies Editor), there were many ways in which this presentation overlapped with the typical “How to Get Published 101” talk. Most of the content was very similar, but in the context of this presentation, she was also able to more actively respond to common misconceptions of publishers and emphasize publisher-library relations. The main distinction she made is that university presses are not commercial presses, and that authors and publishers can have a more collaborative relationship. Professionals, publishers included, are starting from different entry points, but by collating our experiences, we can all help researchers and advance scholarship.

Finally, we wanted to address how others might hold a similar event, particularly at smaller institutions or institutions without a university press. First, we recommend thinking about a potential audience. If librarians are in a position where they interact with students or faculty frequently, they likely have some idea of who might benefit from learning more about the publishing process. If a librarian’s role does not include this type of engagement, it will be useful to collaborate and include someone who does, like a subject librarian. Our collaboration came together smoothly because we have open, respectful, and communicative working relationships with one another, but also because we were all focused on meeting the needs of the audience that our subject librarian had identified. Once organizers understand the different groups of researchers (undergraduates, graduate students, early career faculty, mid-career faculty, late career faculty as well as subject areas like humanities, social sciences, hard sciences, etc.) and their needs, then that can help structure the questions panelists answer in the presentation. We would encourage colleagues not to be afraid of having a narrow audience, as it can sharpen focus and ensure the material covered is really targeted at the audience, which results in a better outcome. Browsing LibGuides, such as the “Nuts and Bolts of Scholarly Publishing” guide from the University of Washington (https://guides.lib.uw.edu/research/publishing),² can be a good starting point to see what sort of information is presented in written format about scholarly communication issues or publishing generally, particularly if the guides are aimed at the same or a similar audience. These can usually be found easily by searching the Internet. Once the audience is identified and panelists agree on the questions they’d like to cover, it’s worth considering what other perspectives would be helpful. This could be someone from a university press or a researcher who is very experienced with publishing articles or monographs. All participants don’t have to be from the same institution; if an institution doesn’t have a university press, for example, organizers might reach out to one that’s in the same state or at a peer institution. Alternatively, librarians at other institutions may have perspective to add and may be willing to join the panel. This could open up the possibility of having a cross-institutional presentation as well, where students from both institutions could join. If someone asks a question that panelists cannot answer immediately, they can investigate the topic after the event and send a follow-up email. Lastly, if an event like this would be helpful at an institution, but planning and executing an event seems impossible due to any obstacle, librarians can focus on elements that are within their control. For example, if no one in the library is willing to collaborate, a subject or liaison librarian might approach a specific disciplinary department and offer to give a talk. Or, if recording isn’t possible, organizing a live event still has value.

Limitations

The survey data discussed here is limited by its small sample size. Only 6 people completed the second survey, which is a response rate of about 9%. We did offer gift cards as incentives, but we realize the recording was perhaps too long for many graduate students to view and assess within a busy period at the end of the autumn semester. Ideally, we would have preferred to gather feedback from more attendees, and this low rate indicates that the need for additional studies to confirm the results. That said, these results fit with all our individual experiences working with humanities graduate students and, along with reviewing existing library literature and talking informally with faculty and students, provided enough information to encourage us to consider additional webinars on topics such as open access and predatory publishing. We are also considering a series of short videos to address frequently asked questions about how to publish a thesis or dissertation and how to read an author’s agreement. Such learning objects, in addition to the existing Copyright Services website managed by Maria and her colleagues, can provide accessible, asynchronous support to graduate students when needed.

Next steps

The choice we made to record our panel presentation has many advantages in terms of our next steps. The recording has maximized the impact of our time and effort; since the information we shared will remain current for the foreseeable future, the recording can remain available for a long period of time to those who may need it. In addition, anyone can view it at any time and get in touch with us if they have additional questions. Not only did we have 65 attendees on the day of the presentation, but the recording has been viewed 28 times after it migrated from Zoom to Mediasite. We linked it to the Department of English’s internal resources page and posted it to the University Libraries’ YouTube page available at for sharing with other library professionals who would like to reference our event to create their own, available at http://youtu.be/f4OyjM2_9_s. We also added a link to the presentation to our LibGuides, such as Johanna’s “Navigating the Article Publishing Process” guide, available at https://guides.osu.edu/article-publishing, and we asked other subject librarians and public-facing faculty and staff members to do the same. Lastly, we are exploring the possibility of having a synchronous re-airing of the presentation with a live question and answer session afterwards, which will require less time and planning than re-doing the presentation, but with the benefit of being able to answer questions and connect with a live audience.

In addition, we plan to take the feedback given to us about additional topics and hold other similar events that address the top concerns. Depending on the topic, this could involve reaching out to new collaborators and asking them to be involved. Alternatively, we could create other kinds of shareable content that address frequently asked questions.

Lastly, the format of this panel is entirely transferrable to different types of information the library strives to share with others. Having a moderator, plus a group of people that have a wide range of experiences and knowledge from both inside and out of the libraries, creating a casual tone, modeling questions around scenarios that have come up before, and recording the presentation so that it remains accessible are all techniques each of us can use when addressing other needs with our stakeholders.

Conclusion

The partnership between three public-facing academic librarians and a university press editor yielded a successful virtual panel about the often complex and evolving scholarly publishing process. The recording is now a learning object for early career humanities researchers in the Department of English and across campus. Conversations about our shared outreach and engagement goals led to strategic planning of an accessible event that can serve as a blueprint for future webinars or videos to fill identified gaps in knowledge potential authors may have about topics such as submitting a proposal, reviewing a publishing contract, or choosing an open access journal. This information is especially helpful to Jennifer, as she works with the Graduate Studies Program in English to integrate these topics in the department’s introductory research methods courses. Surveys after the event provided more information about the webinar’s impact and how we might prioritize topics for future discussions and include other experts from the library, campus, and The Ohio State University Press. We are currently discussing grant opportunities that might lead to humanities graduate student fellowships designed around educating participants on the production and dissemination of scholarship and providing them with transferrable skills if they choose careers outside of the academy. In addition, we are interested in ways we might adapt this workshop for undergraduate students and inspired by a librarian at Purdue University who partnered with a university press editor to create a scholarly communication course (Fraser Riehle, 2022). Colleagues from other academic libraries, no matter the size, can use the prepared questions and the summary of our webinar to plan an event for interested constituents or replicate our strategy, format, and content for their own audiences. Such library-led events can help empower graduate student researchers, especially those who may not receive this education elsewhere, to better understand and confidently participate in the scholarly publishing process for both journal articles and monographs.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Sarah Murphy for supplying us with the demographic information and academic programs of the graduate students as well as Brian Frueh and Jarod Ogier for helping with the webinar.

Disclosure statement

No potential competing interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Johanna Meetz

Johanna Meetz ([email protected]) is an Assistant Professor and the Publishing and Repository Services Librarian at The Ohio University Libraries. She oversees the institutional repository and publishing programs. Previously, she was the Scholarly Communication and Publishing Services Librarian and the Associate Director of Pacific University Press at Pacific University. Her research interests include labor, sustainability, and scalability in library publishing.

Jennifer Schnabel

Jennifer Schnabel ([email protected]) is an Associate Professor at The Ohio State University Libraries, the Subject Librarian for English and the Liaison Librarian for Film Studies and Linguistics. Her research interests include graduate student outreach and undergraduate research project mentorship.

Maria Scheid

Maria Scheid ([email protected]) is the Head of Copyright Services at The Ohio State University Libraries.

Ana Maria Jimenez-Moreno

Ana Maria Jimenez-Moreno ([email protected]) is the Acquisitions Editor for literary studies and cultural studies at The Ohio State University Press.

Notes

1 For more information about our institution’s transformative publishing agreements, please see Walsh, M. P., Springs, G. R., & Foster, A. K. (2022). On the Roads of Transformation: Multiple Pathways to Opening Scholarship at a Large Research Institution. https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.12734740.

2 The LibGuide is based on Julia Hon and Rochelle Lundy’s chapter in the edited collection Academic Library Services for Graduate Students: Supporting Future Academics and Professionals (2020).

Appendix 1:

Survey Questions for Humanities Graduate Students and Early Career Faculty

1. On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with scholarly publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?

2. On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with journal publishing where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?

3. On a scale of 1-5, how would you rate your familiarity with Open Access (OA) where 1 is little to no understanding and 5 is thorough understanding?

4. Do the topics covered in the video address gaps in knowledge you may have had about scholarly publishing?

   1. Yes, all of my questions were answered

   2. Yes, most of my questions were answered

   3. Yes, some of my questions were answered

   4. No, I still have many additional questions

5. What additional topics would you like either more information about or would you like to see covered? Please rank your preferred learning options by dragging and dropping the options, with 1 being the most preferred and 8 being the least preferred.

   1. Understanding and/or negotiating author agreements

   2. Pros and cons of publishing your work open access

   3. How to publish your thesis/dissertation

   4. The article publishing process

   5. Book publishing process

   6. Identifying resources for help/where to go for help

   7. Predatory publishing

   8. Including another person’s material in your publication (such as an image)