Deepen the Impact and Visibility of Rice Research

Fondren provides expertise, space, and information resources to deepen the impact and visibility of research by Rice faculty, staff, and students. As an intellectual hub, Fondren is well-positioned to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration; it also provides diverse expertise to support research and teaching. 

Open Access

  • The Rice Open Access Policy, which was passed by the Faculty Senate in 2012, directs faculty to make copies of journal articles available in the Rice Digital Scholarship Archive. 
  • Fondren Library supports Rice authors publishing in Open Access (OA), peer-reviewed research journals through membership discounts and through offering funds for OA fees. Fondren also supports OA scholarly book publication by Rice authors, including Anthony Pinn’s Interplay of Things: Religion, Art, and Presence Together (Duke University Press).
  • The Rice Digital Scholarship Archive enables faculty to share their work openly; librarians manage the content to ensure that it can be found and is preserved. Materials include Rice faculty members’ research, electronic theses and dissertations, and digitized collections of rare or unique books, images, musical performances, and manuscripts. 
  • As part of its support for affordable course material, Fondren provides resources for finding and using Open Educational Resources (OER).

Publishing Services 

Publishing services at Fondren Library align with the library’s efforts to deepen the impact and visibility of Rice research. Fondren supports the creation of scholarly publications created by members of the Rice community, provides consultations on a wide range of scholarly publishing topics, facilitates the assignment of digital object identifiers (DOIs), and manages several digital publishing platforms.

  • Fondren Library provides journal hosting (Open Journal Systems) for Transnational Asia, an online interdisciplinary journal published by the Chao Center for Asian Studies.
  • Assigning unique Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) is integral in sharing and citing research. Digital Scholarship Services facilitates DOI assignment to journals, datasets, and other scholarly works. DOIs are often required for publications and can assist researchers in tracking citations and providing usage metrics.