Re: open access to dissertations

[Sandy Thatcher <sandy.thatcher@alumni.princeton.edu>]

And a good many universities belong to the NDLTD (Networked Library
of Theses and Dissertations), which is an international group formed
in the mid-1990s that supports broad dissemination of dissertations:
http://www.ndltd.org/

Sandy Thatcher

P.S. The Chronicle has the bad habit of truncating URLs provided in
comments. The full URL for my article is this:
http://www.psupress.org/news/SandyThatchersWritings.html


At 5:16 PM -0700 4/11/11, Joseph Esposito wrote:
>There are at least two separate issues here. One is that some
>librarians are reluctant to purchase books based on dissertations.
>The other is that making dissertations available in OA form may make
>it harder to find a traditional publisher for the works.  These two
>issues undoubtedly overlap.
>
>A third issue, not raised in the excellent Chronicle piece, is that
>there is an economy of dissertations at some institutions.  I am
>familiar with one instance (I have no idea how widespread this
>practice is) where doctoral students are required to post their
>dissertations to an institutional repository.  There is a fee charged
>for this service, which the head of the IR told me generates a
>surplus.  The material is offered on an OA basis.  Note the elements
>of this:  a mandate, a profit to the IR, and OA, with the OA aspect
>potentially interfering with formal publication.
>
>Joe Esposito
>