InSPIRe Guidelines and Policies
Objectives
In support of the mission of the University of Redlands, the main objective of the Institutional Scholarly Publication and Information Repository (InSPIRe) is to:
- Diversify scholarly and creative canons through inclusive and equitable practices.
- Enrich scholarship through the digital preservation of and open access to the University’s scholarly output and creative works.
- Further teaching and learning opportunities by facilitating the publication of open educational resources (OERs).
- Foster understanding of the opportunities, rights, and responsibilities related to online publishing.
- Increase awareness of the University’s scholarly and creative activities and those of its partners.
Establishment of New Communities
All faculty, staff, administrators, students, academic units, and administrative offices are welcome to propose new projects. They along with a liaison from the library faculty will work with InSPIRe personnel and the Redlands Open Scholarship Endeavor (ROSE) committee to explore possibilities. The ROSE Committee will prioritize projects according to the following criteria.
- Relevance to and impact on the University mission
- Relevance to and impact on the Library vision and mission
- Relevance to and impact on curricula and student learning
- Relevance to and impact on scholarly communication (e.g., Will there be access to full text?)
- Extent of resources needed (e.g., Is the material digital or does it require scanning?)
Examples of Communities
Communities can be shaped according to the types of work they contain, particular disciplines, and events. Materials suitable for InSPIRe include, but are not limited to:
Types of Work
- Data sets
- Honors theses and dissertations
- Images, video, and audio files
- Open educational resources (e.g., free online textbooks)
Disciplines
- Scholarly journals
- Undergraduate research journals
- Lecture Series
Events
- Annual conferences
- Performances
- Speaker series
Discovery and Use of Content
InSPIRe content can be split into two categories: the description or metadata that describes a work (e.g., abstract of an article) and the work, or an approximation of the work, itself (e.g., an image of a sculpture). All metadata is made public, and this public information is then regularly crawled and indexed by major search engines. To further the discovery, development, and exchange of new ideas, contributors are encouraged to make the works—or their approximations—public (open access) as well. Doing so permits users to view, download, and print the files. In some communities, contributors will be able to define additional user rights and responsibilities by designating creative commons licenses for their works.
Contributors and Rights and Responsibilities
To support scholarly communication and those who commit their lives to scholarship, InSPIRe does not seek to acquire copyright from content creators. Copyright holders retain copyright to submitted works along with the responsibility to enforce those rights. Contributors who wish to make works freely available through InSPIRe must certify that they own the copyright—or have the necessary permissions—to do so, and grant InSPIRe a non-exclusive license to distribute those works in any format. When contributors use embargoes, InSPIRe will delay distribution accordingly.
Administration of Communities
Successful projects require participation and cooperation among several bodies. Those interested in using InSPIRe to publish or host works will be primarily responsible for the upload and management of those works. In turn the Library will see to the development and configuration of, as well as the coordination necessary to build, maintain, and access InSPIRe and its communities. Furthermore, librarians are prepared to instruct and assist contributors with their copyright questions. To ground and sustain projects over time, a project planning document will be drafted for each community and will provide background information on the community, its primary objectives, and how it aligns with the objectives of InSPIRe.
Revisions to Content
After content has been publicly posted, contributors may ask community administrators to make revisions to either the metadata or document files; revisions should be documented. Contributors may request minor revisions which include correcting typographical and grammatical errors, and adding or correcting metadata to aid discovery. Contributors requesting more significant revisions will be asked to provide a new, revised version, both of which will be made available on InSPIRe. Significant revisions include modifications to research data, analysis, conclusions, and other changes that could otherwise alter the nature of the work.
Removal and Suppression of Documents
InSPIRe, a permanent institutional repository of scholarly and creative activity, seeks to preserve the University’s historical record of scholarship. For this reason, documents will not be removed from InSPIRe unless legally required. However, documents may be suppressed under the certain conditions including:
- Contributors revoke the repository’s non-exclusive license to distribute
- When there is confusion or disagreement over who can grant InSPIRe a non-exclusive license to distribute
- When there is confusion of disagreement over the permissions necessary to make documents public
- When there is reasonable concern that the document may infringe upon another’s copyright, patent rights, trade secrets, or trademarks
- When the document raises issues of defamation, invasion of privacy, or other rights of any person or entity
Preservation of Content
Given the dynamic nature of technology, the Library will make every effort to preserve content, but cannot guarantee that every file in every format will endure and remain usable due to hardware, software, and other technological changes.
