Digital Commons @ West Chester University: Policies & Procedures

Each department, or research unit or center, can decide what is appropriate for inclusion in their part of Digital Commons @ West Chester University. However, while content does not have to be authored by WCU faculty to be included , there does need to be a WCU affiliation.

Any projects submitted to the administrator of Digital Commons @ West Chester University is required to be in an electronic file form ready to be uploaded.

West Chester University faculty and staff can consult with the Academic Computing Digital Corner about the use of scanning facilities to convert hard-copy documents into digital files.

Digital Commons @ West Chester University is intended to be an "Open Access" resource. For information about "Open Access", please consult the tab on that subject that is included with this online guide. Faculty who would like to provide links to their copyright and password protected research articles are encouraged to do so at their SelectedWorks profile.

Digital Commons @ West Chester University is meant to be a permanent scholarly record and once a file is uploaded, a link to the file will always remain. However, authors may request that the administrator remove their work, or a version of their work. They may also request that an updated version be posted.

The WCU Libraries will provide persistent access to Digital Commons @ West Chester University content, but it does not guarantee persistent functionality. If determined necessary by the WCU Libraries, the current set of tools used for this institutional repository may be replaced. The Libraries will preserve all deposited contents through migration.

Digital Commons @ West Chester University provides a virtually unlimited opportunity for e-journal publishing and the posting of conference proceedings of meetings hosted or co-hosted by West Chester University faculty.

Once an e-journal or conference is initiated, administrative responsibities and log-in permissions are granted to conference organizers and e-journal editors so that they can operate the easy-to-use back-end functions of Digital Commons @ West Chester University.

E-journal editors and conference organizers are expected to be committed to creating publications and events that will have an ongoing and consistent run of issues.

E-Journal editors must sign a Memorandum of Understanding to start a new journal.

Academic departments wishing to post student work to Digital Commons @ West Chester University are expected to apply their own high standards in their decisions as to what student work gets posted.

The administrator of Digital Commons @ West Chester University requires that students affirm the originality of their work and grant permission to post it. If this has not occurred already through the student's academic department, the form below can be used.

Please download the PDF, fill in the blanks, and rename the file with your first initial and last name, such as StudentWorkAgreementDByrne. E-mail the file as an attachment to the administrator featured at the box to the right.

IF YOUR RETAIN COPYRIGHT to the work in question, you should be able to submit it to DigitalCommons @ West Chester University directly. Your work will receive increased visibility while raising the prestige of West Chester University. You can learn more about sharing your copyrighted work in a way that does not relinquish your copyright by reading about it at the "Creative Commons" tab of this online guide.

Authors retain any copyright they have for all works posted in Digital Commons @ West Chester University. When submitting material to be posted, each submitter agrees to the following:

I hold the copyright to this document, or have been authorized by the copyright holder(s) to upload it for distribution, and agree to permit this document to be posted in Digital Commons @ West Chester University and made available to the public in any format in perpetuity.

I warrant that the posting of the work does not infringe any copyright, nor violate any proprietary rights, nor contain any libelous matter, nor invade the privacy of any person or third party, nor otherwise violate Digital Commons @ West Chester University policies.

IF YOU DO NOT RETAIN COPYRIGHT, but rather the publisher does, you may check publisher copyright policies to determine what is allowed to be submitted to an institutional repository such as Digital Commons @ West Chester University by checking the  SHERPA-ROMEO web site.

While the listing of publishers at this site is growing, it does not cover all publishers. For this reason, we have been collecting policies from publishers’ web sites, as well as contacting publishers directly when their policy is ambiguous or when it does not address the institutional repository scenario. Please contact us if you have questions.

A number of publishers allow the post print (the post print is defined as the post-peer reviewed version of the article that is accepted by the publisher for final publication) to be submitted to an institutional repository, but not the publisher’s PDF version. SAVE THESE GALLEY PROOF VERSIONS.

We also recommend that authors educate themselves about negotiating copyright with publishers. More information is available at the "Author's Rights Retention Kit" tab of this online guide.