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Academic Librarians Becoming Open-Access Publishers (and Advocates)

Friday May 12, 2023 12:30pm-1:30pm ET

Institute 2023

Mark Aaron Polger�Associate Professor/ Coordinator of Library Outreach / LIB 102 instructor�College of Staten Island, City University of New York�markaaron.polger87@login.cuny.edu�map@journal.marketinglibraries.org

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Agenda

  • What does professional development (PD) mean?
  • Explore my research interests
  • Expand my mind, curiosity, interests
  • Gap in scholarship - library marketing
  • Aha Moment!
  • Becoming an Open Access (OA) Publisher
  • Developing a Mission and Vision
  • Obtaining an ISSN
  • Recruiting a Team, Spreading the word
  • Becoming a Leader
  • Learning the Steps in Academic Publishing
  • Preparing our First Issue
  • Our Editorial Board
  • Other Logistical Issues
  • Getting Indexed
  • Skills Gained From Being Part of MLJ
  • Conclusion

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What Does Professional Development Mean ?�(# 1)

  • Constant learning
  • Curiosity
  • Personal growth
  • Learn new software
  • Get out of your �comfort zone

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What Does Professional Development Mean ?�(# 2)

  • Attending and/or presenting at a conference

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  • Publishing a journal article or book

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  • Going back to school

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  • Becoming a publisher and advocate!

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Explore my Research Interests

  • My research agenda includes library marketing, outreach, user experience (UX) design, library signage, and library jargon

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  • Library marketing is about connecting specific user groups with products and services

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  • It can be applied to non profit �organizations (like libraries)

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Expand My Mind, Curiosity, Interests

  • Curious to learn new software

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  • Improve my teaching methods

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  • Improve my writing

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  • I’m a procrastinator, so it is difficult to start

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Gap in Scholarship - Library Marketing

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  • Library marketing scholarship is scattered across many management, non-profit, and marketing journals

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  • Prior to 2017, there were no academic journals devoted to library marketing

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  • MLS- Marketing Library Services, is a print-based professional newsletter that offers practical advice, tips, and case studies devoted to library marketing

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Aha Moment!

  • Why not create an open-access, online academic journal devoted to library marketing

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  • Seemed easy enough!

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Becoming an Open Access (OA) Publisher

  • Make research freely available for researchers and authors
  • No APCs (author processing charges)
  • No sponsorships or corporate advertising
  • Identified a title, mission & vision, scope & coverage
  • Applied for an ISSN
  • Web site, domain name, email, form management, project management software, manuscript processing,
  • Needed to find an editorial board

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Developing a Mission and Vision

Examined other OA LIS journals :

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    • Communications in Information Literacy (CIL)
    • Library Philosophy and Practice,
    • Weave: Journal of Library User Experience
    • In the Library with the Lead Pipe

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Obtaining an ISSN

  • Applied for an ISSN from the�Library of Congress in Jan 2017

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  • You can apply a few months before the first issue gets published.

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  • Once approved (after the first issue is published), the LOC ISSN transmits data to the international ISSN

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Recruiting a Team, Spreading the Word

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  • WOMM (word of mouth marketing)
  • social media marketing (Facebook & Twitter)
  • email marketing via postings through select library listservs
  • Tabling event @ ALA Annual

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Becoming a Leader

  • I’m not a natural leader

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  • I had to learn how to be: pro-active, self-directed, strategize, innovative, negotiate, empower, motivate, and manage an editorial board of 40+ volunteers

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  • Publishing each issue ----> I needed to be the project manager

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Learning the Steps in Academic Publishing

  • Learned the “flow” in the manuscript submission process.

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  • No budget, no funding, no sponsorships

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  • Did not purchase/subscribe to an automated manuscript processing system

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  • Did not purchase/subscribe to an open journal management system (OJS)

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Preparing our First Issue

  • Developed job descriptions for each role on the editorial board

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  • Defined our open access (OA) parameters

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  • Our Creative Commons license (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike Creative Commons License)---- > BY-NC-SA

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  • Using WordPress commercial web hosting (not the free one)

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  • I serve as chief editor, copy editor, layout editor, final person who does final readthrough and pagination

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Our Editorial Board (#1)�

  • Labour of love
  • Team of dedicated volunteers (library workers from all libraries)
  • Column editors (5 columns, 5 editors)
  • Peer reviewers (single-blind and double-blind)
  • Production team (5 team leads, 20 copy editors & proofreaders)

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Our Editorial Board (#2) �

  • Layout, TOC (table of contents), pagination
  • Web site maintenance
  • Email correspondence
  • Promoting the Journal �(Facebook, Twitter, Library listservs)
  • Bit.ly for shortlinks
  • Adding meta data to DOAJ

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Other Logistical Matters

  • Freedcamp (free project management software)
  • Manuscript process documentation (Google sheets)
  • Jotform (submission /peer reviewer forms)
  • Email hosting (Google Workspace)
  • Web site hosting (DreamHost)
  • Domain and subdomain (https://journal.marketinglibraries.org )
  • HTML versus CMS -we use Wordpress
  • OJS (open journal hosting)- too costly
  • Automated manuscript processing - too costly
  • web hosting, email, & domain name $$ are low

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Getting Indexed (#1)

Applied to be indexed in:

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  • DOAJ
  • Ulrichs serials directory
  • EBSCO databases (rejected)
  • ERIC (pending)
  • Elsevier (pending)
  • SHERPA/RoMEO (pending)
  • Google scholar (it’s a mess)

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Getting Indexed on Google Scholar (GS)

  • To “trick” GS, we included PDF full text links, and a web page with bibliographic metadata

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  • Web page with H1, H2, H3 header tags

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  • Must include title, author, abstract, and citation (APA)
  • GS prefers commercial journal platforms and OJS systems

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Title

Author statement

Abstract

Keywords

References

Publication & full text

Volume, issue, month, year

Getting Indexed on Google Scholar

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Skills Gained From Being Part of MLJ

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  • Leadership
  • Teamwork
  • WordPress
  • Patience
  • Empathy
  • Mentoring
  • Project management
  • Time management
  • Copy editing

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Conclusion

  • Get out of your comfort zone

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  • Learn new things every day

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  • PD is personal growth

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  • Make annual professional goals

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  • PD be applied to other parts of your life

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  • PD is a lifelong investment

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Mark Aaron Polger�Associate Professor/ Coordinator of Library Outreach / LIB 102 instructor�College of Staten Island, City University of New York�markaaron.polger87@login.cuny.edu �map@journal.marketinglibraries.org

Thank you!

Visit MLJ @ https://journal.marketinglibraries.org