JISC Collections agreements for four free journal archives
For immediate release
September 22nd, 2008
Supporting teaching and research with free access to online journal archives:
Over 800,000 journal articles made freely available to universities, research councils and colleges in the UK
Following an open procurement process JISC Collections is making four journal archives freely available, to all colleges, universities and research councils in the UK. These archives from the American Chemical Society, Brill Academic Publishers, ProQuest, and Taylor & Francis include 230 peer reviewed journals with some of the most important articles in the arts, built environment, humanities, life sciences, physical sciences and the social sciences.
JISC Collections’ purchase of these archives means that researchers, teaching staff and students can now have free access to more than 150 years of content and over 800,000 fully searchable articles.
Researchers will now be able to search these articles at a time and place of their own convenience rather than locate print versions which may only be available in a select number of libraries that were able to afford to subscribe to them.
JISC Collections upholds the highest standards in educational licensing and these archives have been purchased following an open and transparent procurement process, with criteria set by the academic community. All of the bids received from publishers were marked and ranked by the community according to their academic quality, value for money and the willingness of the participants to meet the user needs of the JISC community.
Dr Hazel Woodward, University Librarian and Director of the University Press at Cranfield University, and Chair of the JISC Journals Working Group outlines the importance of these agreements to universities, "The competitiveness of UK universities requires access for their researchers to relevant journal material of the widest subject breadth and greatest historical depth, both now and into the future."
Paul Ayris, Director of Library Services at UCL said: "The availability of journal archives in digital form is essential to support research, teaching and learning in UK Universities. The last ten years or so have seen a revolution in the way research in Science, Technology and Medicine is supported, as libraries can deliver 24 x 7 services to their researchers any time, any place, any where. Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences are beginning to follow suit. These new journal archive agreements, co-ordinated by JISC Collections, are an important building block in constructing UK HE's digital future."
Liam Earney, JISC Collections Team Manager, says that "JISC Collections’ archival purchases are already saving the academic community millions of pounds every year, these agreements will add to those savings and increase the availability scholarly content."
Notes for editors:
About the journal archive agreements
The JISC Collections agreement for Periodicals Archive Online is a subset of 80 full text journal backfiles, dating from 1891-2000, for the arts humanities and social sciences from the Periodicals Archive Online collection. Titles in PAO include: Foreign Affairs, the British Journal of Psychology and Modern Fiction Studies.
The JISC Collections agreement for the ACS Legacy Archives provides full-text searching and instant access to all titles, volumes, issues and articles published by the ACS from 1879 to 1995. The best minds from 117 years of chemistry are represented, including over 180 Nobel Laureates in chemistry, physics, physiology and medicine. This group includes Linus Pauling, Irving Langmuir, Carl and Gerty Cori, Elias James Corey, Ahmed Zewail, Rudolph Marcus, Percy Julian, Donald J. Cram, Stanley Prusiner and Selman Waksman. Titles include: Chemical Reviews, the Journal of the American Chemical Society and the Journal of Organic Chemistry.
The JISC Collections agreement for Brill Journal Archive Online provides access to articles from more than 80 journals published by Brill before 2000 covering biology, the humanities, human rights, international law, science and the social sciences. Titles include: T'oung Pao, Church History and Religious Culture and the European Journal of Migration and Law.
The JISC Collections agreement for the Taylor & Francis Geography, Planning, Urban and Environment Online Archive provides access to 28 journal titles from 1996 back to Volume 1, Issue 1 (back to 1885 in one instance). A large number of other journals affiliated with organisations including the Journal of Architecture jointly published with the Royal Institute of British Architects; European Planning Studies published with the Association of European Schools of Planning; and Scottish Geographical Journal, the official journal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society.
About JISC Collections
JISC Collections was established as a mutual trading company by the UK further and higher education funding councils in 2006 to negotiate with publishers of online information and other owners of digital content. The range of resources licensed for use by such agreements constitutes a large national collection of online resources for education and research. JISC Collections is funded by JISC. For further information, please go to http://www.jisc-collections.ac.uk