Open access policy & strategy
In its strategic plan, Utrecht University focuses on Open Science, in which an optimal interaction takes place between society and science. Open Science is inextricably linked to open access; open availability of research results. On this page you will find information about the policy and strategy of Utrecht University and on a national level.
Open access policy at Utrecht University
Utrecht University aims at a publishing climate in which academic authors publish fully open access (OA). The Executive Board of Utrecht University has agreed to a new OA policy in 2022 to realise this ambition.
By expanding the availability of research results, transparency, applicability and reuse of these results increase. In addition, it will benefit the (societal) impact of research. That is why the university wants to increase the number of publications that are published in open access. This fits in with the ambitions in the field of Open Science. Another part of this OA policy is to control the costs of open access publishing.
Central to the open access policy
Utrecht University researchers are expected to make all their publications (journal articles, book chapters and books) open access under an open license, as far as the instruments for open access publication offered by the UU facilitate this at the time of publication.
The following points of departure for academic publications apply:
- They are shared under an open licence. This license stipulates which conditions apply to the spread of the publication. These conditions also include the retention of the author’s or institution’s copyright.
- They are openly available for computational analysis, for algorithmic and machine learning applications.
Open access roads
Several roads are possible:
Utrecht University's strategic plan
The university wants to be a pioneer in the field of Open Science. More emphasis will be placed on the quality of publications. Increasing the availability of research results and data increases transparency, applicability and reuse. This way, valuable knowledge can be shared and applied by researchers, politicians, businesses and social institutions in our country and elsewhere.