News from JSTOR: U. Illinois Press joins CS Program

["Marita LaMonica" <Marita.LaMonica@ithaka.org>]

PRESS RELEASE

The University of Illinois Press signs agreement with JSTOR, joining a new
effort to improve access to current scholarship for faculty, students, and
librarians.

October 27, 2009 - Champaign, IL and New York, NY - The University of Illinois
Press, the not-for-profit publishing division of the University of Illinois,
and JSTOR, the preservation archive and research platform that is part of the
not-for-profit ITHAKA, announced an agreement today to make leading journals
from the Press available worldwide as part of the Current Scholarship Program.

The Current Scholarship Program is a new collaboration initiated by University
of California Press and JSTOR and first announced
<http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/news/announcements/2009.jsp#AugC> on
August 13, 2009.  Together, participants in this Program aim to create an
improved online work environment for faculty and students by bringing complete
journal runs from multiple publishers together in one place, to ease the burden
on librarians of negotiating separate license agreements with a multitude of
publishers and independent titles, and to promote a more cost-effective
publishing environment for the scholarly community.

"For the last several years the University of Illinois Press and JSTOR have
worked together through the History Cooperative, building strong ties of
respect and trust," said Willis G. Regier, Director of the University of
Illinois Press.  "We take this step with the blessings of our colleagues in the
University of Illinois Library and with high anticipation for our journals."

Current and historical content from at least ten University of Illinois
Press-published journals will be available on a re-designed JSTOR in 2011. 
This will offer faculty and students around the world access to current issues
alongside back issues and a growing set of primary source materials from
libraries easily and seamlessly.  JSTOR's nearly 6,000 library participants
worldwide will be able to license the Press's current journals, either
individually or as part of current issue collections, together with JSTOR back
issue collections in a single transaction.  University of Illinois
Press-published journals available as part of the Program will include American
Journal of Psychology, American Music, Journal of Aesthetic Education, and
Journal of American Ethnic History among others.  The journals will also be
preserved in Portico, the digital preservation service that is also part of
ITHAKA.

"The University of Illinois Press has been a leader in promoting digital
scholarship, innovation, and new publishing collaborations in the humanities,"
said Michael Spinella, JSTOR Managing Director. "The Press not only shares our
aim to deliver excellent scholarship at good value to libraries, faculty, and
students, but brings a spirit of cooperation and a strong desire to support new
forms of scholarship using digital technology.  We are thrilled to be working
with them to advance scholarship through the Program."

With the addition of the University of Illinois Press, the current issues of at
least forty journals will be available from JSTOR for the 2011 subscription
year.  Other organizations are being encouraged to join the Program.

Rebecca Simon, Associate Director of University of California Press and Director
of Journals + Digital Publishing added, "It is terrific that the University of
Illinois Press is joining this effort and bringing their fine portfolio of
titles to the Program.  The more like-minded participants we have, the greater
the benefits we are able to deliver to libraries and to users."

For more information, see
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/programs/currentScholarship.jsp

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JSTOR
JSTOR (www.jstor.org <http://www.jstor.org/> ) is a preservation archive and
research platform for the academic community.  Through JSTOR, faculty,
researchers, and students are able to discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive of over 1,000 academic journals,
as well as conference proceedings, monographs, and other scholarly content.
Nearly 6,000 libraries and cultural heritage institutions and hundreds of the
world's leading publishers of scholarly literature participate in and support
JSTOR.  JSTOR is part of ITHAKA (www.ithaka.org <http://www.ithaka.org/> ), a
not-for-profit organization helping the academic community use digital
technologies to advance scholarship and teaching in sustainable ways. ITHAKA
also includes two additional services - Ithaka S+R and Portico.

University of Illinois Press
Founded in 1918, the University of Illinois Press (www.press.uillinois.edu
<http://www.press.uillinois.edu/> ) ranks as one of the country's larger and
most distinguished university presses. The Press publishes more than 120 new
books and 36 scholarly journals each year in an array of subjects including
American history, labor history, sports history, folklore, food, film, American
music, American religion, African American studies, women's studies, and Abraham
Lincoln. The Press is a founding member of the Association of American
University Presses as well as the History Cooperative, an online collection of
more than 20 history journals.