ACRL releases updated scholarly communication toolkit

CHICAGO – The Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) has released a new version of its popular Scholarly Communication Toolkit. The Toolkit has been updated with new and revised content and is now hosted through Springshare’s LibGuides. The Toolkit, developed and maintained by the ACRL Research and Scholarly Environment Committee (ReSEC), continues to provide content and context on a broad range of scholarly communications topics and offers resources and tools for the practitioner. ACRL and ReSEC tapped Christine Fruin, scholarly communications librarian at the University of Florida, to completely revise and redesign the Toolkit and migrate it to ACRL’s LibGuides. The new Toolkit now features sections on topics such as fair use, public access mandates, and library publishing in addition to more fully developed sections on open access publishing and repositories.

“When I was a new librarian ten years ago, just learning about the field of scholarly communications, the Toolkit was an invaluable resource for me and I am honored to have the opportunity to share my knowledge and experience through the revised guide with my fellow librarians,” said Fruin. “LibGuides is a platform familiar to academic librarians and will allow easier reuse and repurposing at other libraries. It will also aid the distributed editorial control of the site that ReSEC would like to maintain.”

Since its launch in 2005, the Toolkit has undergone several revisions and migrations. The Toolkit continues to provide links to examples of specific tools, including handouts, presentations, and videos for libraries to use on their own campuses, and for library school students seeking to incorporate these issues into their course work.

“Because scholarly communications is such a dynamic environment, we like to maintain a freshness and vitality to the Toolkit,” noted ReSEC chair Amy Buckland, institutional repository manager at the University of Chicago.

The Toolkit is also widely used by libraries in conjunction with Open Access Week, an annual global event promoting open models of scholarly communication, which will take place October 24-30, 2016. The ACRL Scholarly Communication Toolkit is freely available online and licensed through Creative Commons. ReSEC welcomes feedback and suggestions for additions to the Toolkit through the link provided on the home page.

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The Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) is the higher education association for librarians. Representing more than 11,000 academic and research librarians and interested individuals, ACRL (a division of the American Library Association) develops programs, products and services to help academic and research librarians learn, innovate and lead within the academic community. Founded in 1940, ACRL is committed to advancing learning and transforming scholarship. ACRL is on the Web at acrl.org, Facebook at facebook.com/ala.acrl and Twitter at @ala_acrl.