Atlanta, GA -- September 20, 2021. LYRASIS announces the expansion of the Open Access Community Investment Program (OACIP). Following a successful pilot program, LYRASIS is opening a new round of funding opportunities to support Open Access (OA) publishing by scholarly journals. The journals seeking investments in OACIP's second phase include Algebraic Combinatorics, History of Media Studies, and Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication.

OACIP is a community-driven framework that enables multiple stakeholders - including libraries of all types, academic departments, and funding agencies - to strategically evaluate and collectively fund open access content initiatives through an efficient process. OACIP brings together investment opportunities in one place and also provides important and consistent information about those opportunities to support informed and principled investment decisions. Participating publishers respond to criteria-based questions about their OA program and the responses are posted on the OACIP website. Using this approach, OACIP provides tailored match-making between nonprofit scholarly publishers that are seeking financial investments from funders (like libraries) that want to support OA publishing aligning with their mission and values. The framework allows the community to take action and support these open resources by increasing the collective knowledge base, expanding awareness of Open Access opportunities, and providing sustainable funding.

Curtis Brundy, Associate University Librarian for Scholarly Communications and Collections at Iowa State University, says, "OACIP offerings are easy to vet, participation through LYRASIS is simple, and I am excited by the opportunities this new service provides for the scholarly publishing community."

Celeste Feather, Senior Director for Content and Scholarly Communication Initiatives at LYRASIS, adds, "OACIP manifests the principles that guide our efforts on behalf of our members and the wider library community to advance scholarly publishing, including innovation, connectivity, inclusivity, and sustainability. This engaging program aligns libraries, non-profit publishers, and other stakeholders in a shared mission."

LYRASIS and Transitioning Society Publications to Open Access (TSPOA) launched OACIP in 2020, piloting the program with two journals: Environmental Humanities and Combinatorial Theory. Both journals met their fundraising goals to publish Open Access content in a sustainable model for the next five years.

Those interested in funding the next round of OACIP journals can learn more and commit funds by visiting the LYRASIS Open Access Community Investment Program website.

About LYRASIS

LYRASIS, a 501(c)(3) is a global non-profit, technology and services membership organization whose mission is to catalyze and enable equitable access to the world's knowledge and cultural heritage through leadership in open technologies, content services, digital solutions, and collaboration with archives, libraries, museums, and knowledge communities worldwide.

About TSPOA

Transitioning Society Publications to Open Access (TSPOA) is a group of like-minded scholarly communication professionals from libraries, academic institutions, publishers, societies, and consortia. We established TSPOA to provide support, advocacy, and referral services for societies and publishers of society journals to help with transitioning to open access publishing. We can be reached at contact-tspoa@googlegroups.com.