Organization and Delivery of Scholarly Communication Services by Academic and Research Libraries in the United Kingdom : Observations from Across the Pond

Fruin, C. (2017). Organization and Delivery of Scholarly Communication Services by Academic and Research Libraries in the United Kingdom: Observations from Across the Pond. Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication, 5(General Issue), eP2157. https://doi.org/10.7710/2162-3309.2157 Organization and Delivery of Scholarly Communication Services by Academic and Research Libraries in the United Kingdom: Observations from Across the Pond


INTRODUCTION
Library involvement in scholarly communication initiatives such as open access to research, management of copyright, and scholarly publishing reform has the potential to positively impact the global dissemination, discovery, and development of scholarship.Libraries across the world hire personnel, organize dedicated units, and develop services aimed at addressing these and other scholarly communication issues.However, when librarians or library organizations research and report on the organization of their activities, they tend to examine practices and trends through a local lens.Further, organization reports and library literature have rarely offered a comparative study on scholarly communication activities at libraries from different countries.The U.K. library community has been quite active in implementing collaborative strategies in key areas such as ensuring publicly accessible research, resource licensing, management of researcher information, and funder/publisher collaboration.Mention of these projects sometimes reaches the ears of U.S. librarians via social media shares or blogs; however, a collective review of these activities in the U.K. has not been given extensive treatment in scholarly literature.U.S. libraries would benefit from learning in greater detail about the practices and experiences of U.K. libraries with respect to the organization and delivery of scholarly communication services and initiatives.By sharing ideas and experiences with a more global audience and learning from one another's successes and failures, scholarly communication personnel within libraries increase the likelihood of achieving the goals of open access and scholarly publishing reform on a larger scale.In order to better understand the organization of scholarly communication activities in U.K. research libraries and inform the decisions made by U.S. research libraries on future directions for the organization and development of scholarly communication initiatives, I conducted an environmental scan of the organization of scholarly communication services in U.K. research libraries.This scan was accomplished through a survey of members of the Research Libraries of the U.K. (RLUK) and interviews with scholarly communication practitioners at several U.K. research libraries.The collected data reveals that the open access policy environment differs in the U.K. as compared to the U.S. and that this accounts for some of the differences in the way the two groups organize scholarly communication services.However, the response of U.K. libraries to the open access policy environment in the U.K. can still inform the decisions made with respect to prioritization and organization of scholarly communication services in U.S. research libraries.

LITERATURE REVIEW
A review of the scholarly literature published in library science journals reveals regular and comprehensive analysis and reporting on the organization and delivery of scholarly communication services at libraries across the United States. 1 However, librarians in the U.S. who wish to know how scholarly communication services are organized in U.K. research libraries will find a paucity of published research providing an environmental scan or comprehensive overview of current practices in U.K. research libraries as a group.There has been significant publicity and discussion via social media and blogs on the growth of open access initiatives in the U.K. and Europe as well as reporting on the importance of libraries to researchers as they engage in the discovery, research, and publishing activities that comprise scholarly communications (Wolff).However, there is little in the published scholarly literature providing more comprehensive coverage on how U.K. libraries are organizing and delivering scholarly communication services and responding collectively to scholarly communication issues.In the U.S., the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) regularly publishes white papers and reports in the form of its SPEC kits on North American research library activities,2 and these publications frequently address open access, library publishing, and other scholarly communication activities.However, organizational reporting on the state of scholarly communication activities within U.K. libraries by U.K. library organizations such as the RLUK3 and Society of College, National and University Libraries (SCONUL) 4 is less frequent and not as readily available to the global library audience.
A review of U.K. library organization outputs disclosed only a handful of reports on scholarly communication activity.The most comprehensive report on scholarly communication services in the U.K. was published in 2007 by the now-defunct Research Information Network (RIN).When it was formed in 2005, RIN's stated mission was "to lead and coordinate new developments in the collaborative provision of research information for the benefit of researchers in U.K. higher education." To that end, RIN worked with the research, library and information, and publishing communities to develop an understanding of scholarly communication processes and policies in the U.K. (Jubb).In 2007, RIN, in consultation with the RLUK's predecessor the Consortium of Research Libraries, produced a comprehensive survey of library activities with respect to scholarly communication.This report collected and compiled statistics on open access advocacy activities as well as institutional repository hosting and management by U.K. academic libraries.
In 2011, the RLUK released a similar report that examined how U.K. libraries leveraged evolving technologies to support researchers.Examples of library scholarly communication activity presented in the report included development of new scholarly communication related positions within U.K. libraries, utilization of social media to promote services and resources, and collaboration with institutional offices of research.Additionally, the report highlighted the involvement of U.K. research libraries in the hosting and management of institutional repositories.
Outside of these two reports from U.K. library organizations, the body of published scholarly literature available on the topic of scholarly communication activities by libraries in the U.K. focuses primarily on case studies by individual libraries of open access services and support rather than providing any in-depth review of scholarly com-munication as a practice among U.K. research libraries.In 2012, SAGE hosted a roundtable at the British Library where several academic librarians gathered to discuss the role of academic libraries in open access advocacy, and this resulted in the production of an article that provided more of an overview of the state of scholarly communication in the U.K. library community.Participants concluded that academic libraries have a role to play in teaching students and faculty about open access and locating open access resources as well as assisting in management of open access through hosting of institutional repositories and administering open access funds (Harris).Two other comprehensive articles were authored by current RLUK executive director David Prosser who early-on promoted the importance of institutional repositories (2003) and the role that academic libraries should play in developing, managing, and promoting them (2004).Additional articles focus on open access activities at specific U.K. libraries, including an article about the development of a repository at Imperial College Library (Afshari) and an article about development of an open access funding and advocacy support program at the University College of London in response to funder mandates (Sharp).The recent publication of articles focused on individual library activities in the area of open access can be attributed to open access policy development by not only British and European research funders but also by the Higher Education Funding Council of England (HEFCE),5 which is the organization that funds and regulates colleges and universities in England.
As stated above, a review of library literature did not reveal much scholarly coverage on how scholarly communication services are organized in U.K. research libraries as a group.Interestingly, an article in an Australian library journal provides a general overview of the staffing of scholarly communication in libraries not just in Australia but also in the U.S. and the U.K. The author noted the increase of staffing in scholarly communication roles in U.K. libraries and suggested that these new scholarly communication personnel were not always trained as professional librarians (Steele).Similarly, the Head of the Office of Scholarly Communication at Cambridge University also indicated in a published interview that the majority of staff in her office are not librarians but are PhD holders and scholars, which allows them to "talk as peers with researchers." Further, she notes that traditional librarian training is insufficient for academic librarians and that conducting research for the purpose of achieving tenure as an academic librarian is not an expectation in the U.K. as it typically is in the U.S. (Upshall).This is a compelling observation regarding the training and skills of scholarly communication staff in U.K. research libraries that should be of interest to librarians globally and will hopefully be a topic of future research.
The growth of open access in the U.K., notably the increase in funder and government sponsored mandates and how libraries in the U.K. are responding, is a topic of interest for U.S. libraries who are similarly organizing a response to public access mandates issued by several federal government and some private funders.Further, the fact that libraries in the U.K. are organizing teams or units whose primary responsibility is the delivery of scholarly communication services such as institutional repository management and library publishing, should also be of interest to any library organizing the same, as there are always lessons to be learned in the experiences of others.However, there has been sporadic organizational reporting, and only a small body of scholarly literature produced on the current state of scholarly communication services at academic and research libraries in the U.K., and nothing in the literature providing a comparison of the organization of scholarly communication at U.K. and U.S. research libraries, which can be useful for both when evaluating future directions or developing new programs that are geared toward areas of mutual concern such as open or public access compliance.

METHODS
To learn more about the organization and delivery of scholarly communication services at U.K. research libraries in an effort to better inform librarians on both sides of the Atlantic on activities directed toward common goals, I distributed a survey to the library members of the RLUK and conducted follow-up in-person interviews with survey respondents who indicated an interest in participating in such.An online survey was prepared in Qualtrics and distributed by email to the 37 members of the RLUK in December 2015.RLUK member libraries were selected on account of the organizational representation of research libraries being similar to the ARL in the U.S. In-person interviews took place through on-site visits and during the RLUK Annual Meeting at the British Library on March 9-11, 2016.Online survey respondents were informed by cover letter that their participation was voluntary and that their responses would remain anonymous and confidential.Respondents were presented with the option of identifying themselves for the purpose of indicating interest and availability for in-person interviews.Prior to the in-person interviews, subjects verbally consented to the interview and were informed that their identities and responses would remain anonymous.
Because the purpose of this research was to compare organization of scholarly communication services in U.K. research libraries to that of U.S. research libraries, the online survey questions were based upon the ARL SPEC Kit "Organization of Scholarly Communication Services, " which was distributed in 2012 to North American research libraries who are members of ARL (Radom).The survey that was prepared for current research, like the ARL survey, was intended to complete an environmental scan on the organization of scholarly communication services in research libraries.The questions asked on the survey inquired into the types of library personnel who are charged with responsibility for delivering scholarly communication related services and whether efforts were confined within the library or were provided in partnership with other university offices.Further, respondents were asked about the types of services offered, any plans to change or enhance those services, and what was the perceived greatest benefit derived from offering these services to their constituents. 6or the in-person interviews, ten questions that were intended to delve more deeply into the general topics covered in the online survey were prepared in advance of the interviews to guide discussion.Interviews were recorded on a digital voice recorder with the consent of the interview subject, and the audio file was destroyed after notes were compiled for this paper.The questions posed to interviewees were as follows: 1. Tell me about a "day in the life" of scholarly communication services at your library -the activities, questions, tasks -and how are these triaged across your department/ unit/library?

Survey Results
Twelve of the 37 RLUK member libraries to whom the survey link was distributed responded to the online survey.Because the intention of this research was to compare the organization of scholarly communication services in U.K. research libraries to research libraries in the U.S., responses to the survey that is the subject of this paper have been compared to the ARL member library responses to the 2012 ARL SPEC Kit survey.Sixty of the 126 ARL members responded to the SPEC Kit survey so there is a difference in sample sizes between these two surveys.The comparison presented in this paper is for the purpose of illustrating similarities in issues and priorities in research libraries in two different countries and differences in how these two groups have organized services in response to these similar issues and priorities.
One of the most interesting comparisons between research libraries in the U.K. and in the U.S. is the identification of persons responsible for delivery of scholarly communication services.According to the results of the 2012 ARL survey, 53% of the 60 responding U.S. research libraries indicated that they only assigned one or two individuals with this task.However, 100% of the U.K. research libraries responding to the present survey indicated that delivery of scholarly communication services was either provided by teams composed of several librarians and staff members or by a cross-institution committee or group composed of librarians and representatives from institutional offices of research and computing.
In response to the question on the types of scholarly communication services that research libraries in the U.K. are providing, there was an overwhelming similarity in the types of services that U.K. libraries provide as compared to the responses provided by U.S. libraries on the ARL SPEC Kit survey; however, a few differences must be noted.All of the U.K. research libraries responding to the survey indicated that they provide financial support of open access publishing through open access publishing funds, which are typically supported by funder block grants.However, only 33% of those responding to the same question on the 2012 SPEC Kit survey indicated that they maintain a fund to support open access publishing.Conversely, U.K. survey respondents indicated that they less frequently engage in hosting or publishing scholarly journals and in supporting digital humanities/e-science initiatives as compared to the U.S. research libraries who responded to the ARL survey.U.K. libraries responding to the present survey indicated that they regularly collaborate with offices external to the library in the delivery of scholarly communication services.Seventy-five percent of those U.K. libraries that responded, as compared to only 6% of the U.S. libraries responding to the ARL survey, suggested that scholarly communication services were significantly supported through collaboration with or directly provided by offices external to the library.Most of the U.K. libraries who responded to the present survey described significant partnerships and collaborations between libraries and institutional research offices.These partnerships or collaborations involved shared administration and hosting of repositories and related researcher information systems that those research offices typically fund, as well as library management of block grants received by research offices used to support open access publishing.Further, a couple U.K. libraries indicated that responsibility for copyright education and consultation existed outside the library with either information technology or instructional technology staff; U.S. libraries who responded to the ARL SPEC Kit survey indicated that copyright services were generally provided by libraries and sometimes coordinated with the university's general counsel.
In both surveys, U.K. and U.S. research libraries indicated that the organization and provision of scholarly communication services are subject to change and enhancements.Specific to the U.K., there was a reported intention to hire additional personnel to support open access, publishing initiatives, and digital humanities.There was also suggestion that changes in national policy with respect to open access would have an impact on the scholarly communication services provided by libraries.
In the final question of the present survey, respondents were asked what they perceived as the greatest benefit to the university as a result of the library's provision of scholarly communication services.The majority of respondents indicated that the greatest benefit was helping authors increase the discoverability and impact of their scholarship.Other benefits reported include: • Promoting author's rights (copyright) • Assisting authors with selection of an appropriate publication venue

• Promoting compliance with and interpretation of open access mandates
• Emphasizing the library's role and importance in higher education and scholarly publishing

Interviews
As part of this research, interviews were conducted with scholarly communication personnel from seven of the libraries that responded to the survey; interviews were with multiple persons at the on-site visits and with persons who did not complete the online survey.These interviews were conducted both on-site at the research libraries and during the RLUK annual meeting.These conversations revealed more in-depth detail on the organization of scholarly communication services at U.K. research libraries and provided greater clarity on these libraries' priorities.
In reviewing and categorizing the comments made during in-person interviews, three overarching themes emerged: 1. Scholarly communication has increased as a priority for U.K. research libraries.by the open access mandates but also internally so that library personnel who would be responding to inquiries or who would be assisting with compliance efforts would be up to speed on the new requirements and services.

Scholarly communication
According to interviewees, the shift in priority of scholarly communication within U.K. research libraries and with university administrations has allowed libraries to refocus their role as an important participant in the production of scholarly information as opposed to merely being a consumer of scholarly information.This shift in focus has led, in some of the interviewees' libraries, to the development of new services and new positions in areas such as bibliometrics, library publishing, and research data management.Bibliometrics services in two of the libraries that were visited has led to increased col-laboration with individual colleges or departments to support production of research impact reports.This work has helped change attitudes about traditional metrics and caused some colleges and departments to reconsider traditional measurements of impact and instead place equal value on alternative metrics when making decisions about promotion and tenure.One interviewee noted that the library's bibliometrics work has led to a "wider definition of impact -not just within the discipline, but also measuring impact upon policy development, the government, and the general public." U.K. research libraries are also investigating library publishing services.One library indicated that they were utilizing "their experience as facilitators and intermediators in information production as well as capitalizing on their experience with open access and emerging technologies" to successfully move into publishing.Another library stated that library publishing presented "enormous opportunities to do different things and to enable academics to disseminate their work in different ways." Interviewees discussed activities at not only their own libraries but also highlighted large scale publishing efforts that were being undertaken by other U.K. research libraries.Some interviewees referenced the closure of university presses and the assumption by libraries of continued publication of scholarly journals that had been produced by those presses.Some libraries were also experimenting with alternative publishing platforms, including blogs by scholars, with success and acceptance by those in the field in which the publishing was being done.
Another service that is being developed at some of the libraries interviewed is research data management.One library indicated that development of this service is in anticipation of an expansion of open access mandates to research data.Another library viewed research data management as a natural complement to the scholarly communication services offered in support of scholarly publishing generally and open access specifically.

DISCUSSION
Scholarly communication practitioners in U.S. research libraries, as can be gleaned from the results of the 2012 ARL SPEC Kit survey, share commonalities with respect to the organization and delivery of scholarly communication services in those libraries.However, a review of the U.K. research library survey results and interviewee responses demonstrate that assumptions cannot be made that such services are similarly organized and delivered at libraries outside the U.S.Although both U.S and U.K research libraries engage in open access advocacy, library publishing, institutional repository management, and other scholarly communication activities, the major difference in the open access policy landscape as well as the difference in copyright laws in the U.S. and the U.K. likely account for how those services are prioritized and staffed.
The survey and interviews demonstrate that U.K. have more dedicated personnel to scholarly communication than U.S. research libraries have presently employed.In U.S. academic and research libraries, scholarly communication is typically delegated to a single individual or to a very small team comprising a librarian and one or two support staff (Herold and Radom).However, the current study shows that U.K. research libraries often employ larger teams to deliver scholarly communication services.Survey responses and in-person interview discussions indicated that that these teams include anywhere from 4-10 persons.Another interesting observation from the in-person library visits was that these teams often work in large collaborative spaces without separation by office doors or cubicle walls.The hum of activity and across-the-room discussion differs from the arrangement of library professionals typically observed in U.S. academic libraries.
The increased priority of funder open access mandate compliance at institutions of higher education in the U.K. stands as the primary reason for the larger team approach to scholarly communication in U.K. research libraries.Managing several open access funds, the uptick in deposits into the institutional repository or CRIS, as well as the increased need for education and consultations on open access mandate compliance, demand a larger workforce dedicated to these services.Funder mandates in the U.S., such as those by federal government agencies, do not require publication in an open access journal and therefore do not necessarily increase the need for support of payment of APCs charged by open access journals or hybrid publications.Rather, the majority of the funder mandates in the U.S. require deposit by the funded author in the funder's own repository rather than in a repository managed by the library (SPARC).
With the U.K. open access mandates, particularly the recent HEFCE mandate, closely tied to financial support received by U.K. universities, the administrations of those institutions have made open access a university-wide rather than just a library priority.As a result, there is greater need for collaboration between U.K. libraries and university administrators, such as the institutional research office, than what is typically observed at U.S. institutions.U.K. institutions must leverage the experience libraries have in managing repositories and navigating publisher policies in order to bolster compliance efforts.Libraries are also entrusted with management of the blocks of funds dispensed to U.K. universities' offices of research to support the gold open access publishing done by their funded researchers.
While U.K. research libraries have dedicated more resources to open access compliance, they have not done so, as the survey and interview results indicate, in the area of copyright consultation and management.At U.S. institutions of higher education, it is commonly known that libraries serve as the primary contact for copyright question.The ARL SPEC Kit survey results also support this claim.A couple of the librarians interviewed for this paper indicated that copyright inquiries are frequently routed to the information technology offices at their campuses, particularly where those questions relate to supporting academics as teachers in their use of copyrighted materials in class.Interviewees indicated that historically library involvement in copyright was limited to ensuring compliance with license agreements and how licensed resources could be used by patrons.This difference in the level of copyright consultation services provided by U.K. libraries as compared to U.S. libraries is likely due to the availability of a broader fair use provision under U.S. copyright law as compared to the narrower fair dealing provision under U.K. copyright law.
Relatedly, persons interviewed indicated that the increased focus on open access has led to an increased concern with author's rights, and libraries are starting to take on the role of educating authors about management of their own copyright.A couple libraries indicated that they have begun advocating use of an author's addendum.Further, a movement is underway to promote adoption by a large number of U.K. universities of a Harvard-style open access policy.Most of the U.K. libraries interviewed indicated that their universities had adopted open access policies prior to the advent of the funder mandates.These policies, frequently referred to as publication policies, only require deposit in the repository; they do not create any kind of license from authors to the university or otherwise manage the author's copyright. 11Interviewees indicated that compliance with these policies has not been a priority in recent years due to the release of funder mandates.However, compliance with HEFCE and a contemporaneous raising of consciousness about author's rights and embargoes has inspired the U.K. library community to begin discussions and negotiations to adopt an open access policy that would grant U.K. universities a pre-existing license to the scholarly works of their researchers (Banks).

CONCLUSION
This research concludes with a few takeaways for U.S. scholarly communication practitioners.One of these takeaways is the importance of collaboration with university administration.U.S. library deans and directors along with their scholarly communication staff should more actively endeavor to collaborate with offices of research or other offices charged with compliance in order to encourage university-wide discussions on open access and to assert the important role libraries can play in supporting researcher compliance with funder mandates.Libraries have expertise in technologies, publishing, and copyright management that could be leveraged by institutional offices to support development of programs to assist researchers who are subject to public access mandates or who have an interest in ensuring wider access to their published scholarship.
Another takeaway for scholarly communication practitioners in the U.S. is to reexamine their libraries' current organization and delegation of responsibilities for services that fall under the umbrella of scholarly communication.As observed during the in-person interviews, the model adopted by several U.K. research libraries is creation of a large team dedicated to coordinating and collaborating in the delivery of scholarly communication services.This not only facilitates in the development of workflow and other efficiencies related to library publishing, institutional repository management, and open access advocacy, but also increases the visibility of a library's scholarly communication program to the larger university community.Further, the number of services that fall within the definition of scholarly communication is too wide and varied to be successfully pursued by a single or pair of individuals (Herold 5A.Please provide the job title, responsibilities and qualifications of the individual who has primary responsibility for organizing and delivering scholarly communications services at your library or institution.
5B. Please provide the job title, responsibilities, and qualifications of the individuals who have primary responsibility for organizing and delivering scholarly communications services at your library or institution.
5C. Please provide the unit/department name, responsibilities, and number of staff comprising the unit or department who has primary responsibility for organizing and delivering scholarly communications services at your library or institution.
5D. Please provide the committee/task force name, responsibilities, and composition of the committee or task force who has primary responsibility for organizing and delivering scholarly communications services at your library or institution.

2.
What types of outreach activities do you currently conduct?What topics and what modes of outreach (workshops, web pages, brown bag)? 3. What types of scholarly communication questions do you most frequently get from faculty? 4. Do you interact with students?Through what means?What types of scholarly communication questions do your students frequently have? 5. What copyright issues do faculty confront?In their teaching (in-person/online?)?In their own research/writing?Do you/they have any opinions on the limitations under Britain's fair dealing exception as compared to the U.S. 's broader fair use exception?6. Do you have an institutional repository?If yes, what is the level of faculty participation?How is it marketed?7. Do you have an open access policy at your institution?If yes, tell me about the process in proposing and adopting it (who had responsibility, what were concerns, how were those concerns addressed) If no, do you foresee this being proposed and passed in the near future?8.Is your library engaged in publishing?Using OJS or some other platform?Is this just of faculty edited/produced research or also student works?9. Does your institution have an open access publishing fund?If yes, what is the source of those funds and how is the fund administered?10.Any other information you'd like to share with me about scholarly communication at your institution?

Table 1 .
Scholarly Communication Services in U.K. Libraries (as Compared to U.S. Libraries) In response to the national open access policy shift, interviewees stated that their libraries hired or appointed dedicated scholarly communication personnel to assist with mandate compliance, including management of the block grants disbursed by funding agencies to cover article processing charges (APC) that are assessed to authors publishing in gold open access journals.Publication of research in gold open access journals is required by certain funder mandates and also recommended by the Finch Report.While all those interviewed indicated that part of the scholarly communication services offered included management of these block grants disbursed by funders, only a few libraries additionally managed institutional funds established to support open access publishing by researchers and faculty who were not eligible for or subject to the funder mandates.Supporting compliance with open access mandates became an even larger priority for U.K. research libraries with the release of a directive by HEFCE that all journal articles and conference proceedings that would be submitted as part of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) had to be deposited in an open access institutional or subject repository within 90 days of acceptance for publication.The interviewees indicated that their respective libraries responded to this policy change by assembling scholarly communication teams to not only continue management of the block grants and other institutional funds committed to covering APCs but also to respond to the large increase of deposits in their institutional repositories, including creation of appropriate metadata, monitoring of applicable embargoes, and collaboration with research offices and other administration to ensure accurate reporting and compliance.For some interviewees, response to the REF has also included additional collaboration with research offices, particularly where the institutional repositories have been superseded by a Current Researcher Information System (CRIS), primarily Elsevier's Pure, 10 which most indicated was managed and funded jointly by research offices and the libraries.Finally, all those interviewed indicated that the increased focus on open access required development of additional training and outreach not only externally with those affected services at U.K. research libraries largely consist of efforts to support compliance with funder open access mandates.3.U.K. research libraries are creating new positions and services that reflect the shift in libraries from being information consumers to information producers.U.K. research libraries are creating new positions and services that reflect the shift in libraries from being information consumers to information producers.U.K. libraries have promoted open access for nearly two decades; however the issuance of open access mandates from research funders Wellcome Trust 7 and RCUK, 8 and the release of a report on open access commonly referred to as the "Finch Report", 9pushed open access to the top of the priority list for U.K. research libraries(Picarra).
). Aspects of scholarly communication ideally should be a part of every librarian's repertoire.A final takeaway for U.S. scholarly communication practitioners is the importance of contributing their expertise on scholarly communication issues, such as open access and copyright, to government processes.Open access enjoys acceptance and strength in the U.K. partially on account of governmental acknowledgement and support of open access principles.In the U.S. form of government, there are opportunities to influence and participate in the shaping of law and policy through communication with legislators and responses to calls for public comment by government agencies and branches.U.S. libraries should directly communicate with state and federal representatives whenever legislation is proposed that would either positively or negatively impact access to published scholarship, educational materials, or other copyrighted works.Libraries should also, either individually or in concert, respond to calls for comment issued by federal agencies or other governing offices on matters relevant to libraries.Despite some of the differences in the organization of scholarly communication services in U.K. academic and research libraries as compared to U.S. libraries, scholarly communication practitioners here can utilize the experiences in the U.K. in adapting or enlarging services offered at U.S. libraries.The model of engagement presented by the experience of U.K. scholarly communication practitioners can inform the future direction and activity of those in U.S. academic and research libraries and lead to the creation of new services and expansion or reorganization of current efforts.The purpose of this survey is to discover the level and type of scholarly communications services offered at research libraries in the United Kingdom.Scholarly communication is understood as the creation, transformation, dissemination, and preservation of knowledge related to teaching, research and scholarly endeavors.Among the many scholarly communications issues are author rights, economics of scholarly publishing, new models of publishing (including library based publishing, open access, access to publicly funded research, etc.), and preservation of intellectual assets.Information is being collected as part of a larger research project being conducted by Christine Fruin, Scholarly Communications Librarian at the University of Florida, who will be visiting the United Kingdom March 5-12, 2016 for the purpose of learning more about the organization and delivery of scholarly communications services in the U.K. If you would like to schedule a visit with Christine Fruin at either your library or during the RLUK conference, please complete the information at the end of the survey.If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Christine Fruin at christine.fruin@uflib.ufl.edu.___ Two or more individuals who are not part of a single unit or department ___ A single unit or department ___ A cross-library or cross-institution committee or task force ___ Other (please describe) ____________________ (Respondents were taken to one of the following questions depending upon their response) 6. Please select the scholarly communications services that are offered by your library or institution __ Outreach and education on scholarly communications (e.g.workshops, events) __ Author rights, including review and advisement on publisher contracts __ Fair use/fair dealing, including advisement on inclusion of copyrighted materials in research and teaching __ Hosting or publishing of electronic journals (open access or subscription based) __ Support to authors in writing and editing (e.g.citation management, literature searches) __ Host or manage institutional repository __ Host or manage a subject or disciplinary repository __ Advise authors on compliance with funder open access mandates (private and governmental) __ Consultation with students on copyright and other scholarly communications issues pertaining to their research and publications __ Support for hosting of electronic theses and dissertations __ Consultation on open access publishing, including advisement on evaluation of open access journals __ Financial support of open access publishing through an open access publishing fund __ Enactment and implementation of an open access policy at either a departmental or institutional level __ Assistance with assessment of research impact __ Support of researcher identification system (e.g.ORCID) __ Support for digital humanities, e-science or e-scholarship initiatives __ Data management or curation __ Other (please describe) ____________________ 7. Are scholarly communications services provided by any person or unit outside the library?__ Yes __ No 7A.Please describe who else provides scholarly communications services, what services are provided, and how these are coordinated with the library.8.Are there any plans to change or enhance the scholarly communications services that are presently provided?__Yes __ No 8A.Please describe the plans to change or enhance services.9.What do you perceive as the greatest benefit of your library or institution providing scholarly communications services?10.What do you perceive as the greatest scholarly communications need of the constituents your library or institution serves?11.Would you or someone at your library/institution be willing and available to meet with Christine Fruin the week of March 7-11, 2016 __ Prefer an in-person visit at my library/institution __ Prefer to meet at the RLUK Conference __ No one is available to meet at this time