Funding Open Access: Checklist

If you are a member of the University of Bremen or an institution of higher education in Bremen, there are several options available to help cover the costs of Open Access publishing.
Use the steps below to check which options apply to you and apply for funding from the State and University Library Bremen (SuUB) via the following online form:

Online application for funding of an open access publication

A. Articles in Open Access journals

1. Which publisher is your journal published by?

The SuUB has concluded agreements with many publishers to cover Open Access publication costs. Under these agreements, publication fees are paid centrally and through a standardized process. Such agreements exist with Springer, Elsevier, and Wiley (DEAL), as well as with Cambridge University Press and Sage.

2. Is your article based on research funded by third-party grants?

Many research funders cover the costs of Open Access publications. These costs should therefore already be taken into account when planning the budget for your funding proposal. We recommend contacting your funding organization directly to find out about the available options.

3. Is your article eligible for funding through the SuUB Open Access Publication Fund?

The SuUB Open Access Publication Fund provides financial support to reimburse or directly cover the costs of publishing articles in Gold Open Access journals.

The publication fund covers your article processing charges (APCs) in full, provided that certain conditions are met. Please check our funding criteria.

If your publication cannot be funded through the three options above, you may wish to consider the following alternatives:

• Could another (eligible) journal be an option for you?
• Is Open Access self-archiving (Green Open Access) a possible alternative?
• Please also note that there are many Gold Open Access journals that do not charge publication fees to authors (sometimes referred to as “Diamond Open Access”). Through funding memberships and pledgings, the SuUB also supports publishing infrastructures that follow the diamond model (e.g. the Open Library of Humanities). In the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), you can search both for Gold Open Access journals that charge APCs and for those that do not.

We are happy to support you with these questions. Please contact us at publizieren@suub.uni-bremen.de

B. Monographs and contributions to edited volumes

In many disciplines, monographs and contributions to edited volumes are the preferred form of scholarly communication. We also support Open Access publishing in this area by covering part of the Gold Open Access publication costs for monographs and edited volumes.

Please contact us for further information at publizieren@suub.uni-bremen.de

Funding criteria

To be eligible for funding from the publication fund, the following conditions must be met:

• The responsible corresponding author is a member of the University of Bremen, Bremen University of Applied Sciences, Bremerhaven University of Applied Sciences, or the University of the Arts Bremen. The affiliation with one of these institutions must be stated as the primary affiliation in the article.
• The article is published in a genuine Open Access journal in which all content is freely and immediately available upon publication under a Creative Commons license (Gold Open Access). Costs for making individual articles Open Access in so-called hybrid journals cannot be covered. In the hybrid model, the journal remains subscription-based, and only individual articles can optionally be made Open Access upon payment of a fee.
• The journal must apply a quality assurance process that is recognized in the respective discipline. This applies, for example, to all journals listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ).
• Funding cannot be provided for articles published in so-called predatory journals.
• Additional charges for fast-track peer review, excess length, editorial services, or similar services cannot be covered.

We strongly recommend submitting a funding request via our online form before submitting your paper to a journal. This allows us to check whether your publication is eligible for funding and to provide you with a reliable funding confirmation at an early stage. If funding is approved, you may ask the publisher to send the invoice directly to us. Otherwise, you can simply forward your invoice to publizieren@suub.uni-bremen.de