Sustainable Scholarship
JMU Libraries is committed to providing inclusive and equitable access to the materials you need for research, teaching, and learning. Our partnerships and spending commitments should align with community needs and our values. While analyzing costs, usage, and growth trends are one component of this work, they are not the only considerations. Evaluating rights retention, licensing terms, and equity are foundational to our goal of a more open, equitable, and inclusive scholarly communications landscape.
Our immediate concerns are cost and equity:
- Cost: Journal package prices are outpacing university budgets and inflation. After growing 166% over the last 20 years, the cost of journals has reached a crisis point. Continuing this trend would force untenable sacrifices in our collections. Commercial journal vendors have profit margins approaching 40%, achieved by charging 3 to 10 times what nonprofits charge for journals with similar rates of citation.
- Equity: Researchers in Virginia (and peers around the world) donate their time and effort as editors and peer reviewers to private journal vendors, only to see their work locked behind paywalls. Most of JMU’s published research is supported by public funds, yet many of our research products are inaccessible to the public. In fact, a great deal of published work is inaccessible to non-wealthy institutions of higher educations – further compounding deleterious effects of economic stratification. This arrangement is fundamentally inequitable and contrary to the mission of a public university.
By the Numbers
| Elsevier ScienceDirect | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022** | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $410,416.40 | $424,780.97 | $429,070.00 | $223,495.11 | $231,317.44 | $239,413.55 |
| Rate of Increase | 3.5% | 1.0% | -47.9% | 3.5% | 3.5% | |
| Increase (actual***) | $14,364.57 | $4,289.03 | ($205,574.89) | $7,822.33 | $8,096.11 |
* Complete 2021 usage data not available until
2022.
**Projected materials budget after 2021 based on flat budget.
***Actual increase does
not equate to contractual rate of increase due to journal title transfers in and out of collection.
| SpringerLink | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022** | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $130,597.19 | $135,821.09 | $141,253.93 | $141,253.93 | $144,079.01 | $149,842.17 | $155,835.86 | $162,069.29 |
| Rate of Increase | 4.0% | 4.0% | 0.0% | 2.0% | 4.0% | 4.0% | 4.0% | |
| Increase (actual***) | $1,436.57 | $5,432.84 | $0.00 | $2,825.08 | $5,763.16 | $5,993.69 | $6,233.43 |
* Complete 2021 usage data not available until
2022.
**Projected materials budget after 2021 based on flat budget.
***Actual increase does
not equate to contractual rate of increase due to journal title transfers in and out of collection.
| Wiley Online Library | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022** | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $196,959.00 | $203,853.00 | $210,988.00 | $218,373.00 | $225,797.68 | $233,474.80 | $241,412.95 | $249,620.99 |
| Rate of Increase | 3.5% | 3.5% | 3.5% | 3.4% | 3.4% | 3.4% | 3.4% | |
| Increase (actual***) | $6,894.00 | $7,135.00 | $7,385.00 | $7,424.68 | $7,677.12 | $7,938.14 | $8,473.97 |
* Complete 2021 usage data not available until
2022.
**Projected materials budget after 2021 based on flat budget.
***Actual increase does
not equate to contractual rate of increase due to journal title transfers in and out of collection.
| Sage Premier | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022** | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $240,447.53 | $247,377.63 | $264,848.69 | $276,766.88 | $285,069.89 | $293,621.98 | $302,430.64 | $311,503.56 |
| Rate of Increase | 2.9% | 7.1% | 4.5% | 3.0% | 3.0% | 3.0% | 3.0% | |
| Increase (actual***) | $6,930.10 | $17,471.06 | $11,918.19 | $8,303.01 | $8,552.10 | $8,808.66 | $8,613.21 |
* Complete 2021 usage data not available until
2022.
**Projected materials budget after 2021 based on flat budget.
***Actual increase does
not equate to contractual rate of increase due to journal title transfers in and out of collection.
| Taylor & Francis | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022** | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $259,210.00 | $271,847.06 | $279,877.55 | $279,214.17 | $287,590.60 | $296,218.31 | $305,104.86 | $314,258.01 |
| Rate of Increase | 4.9% | 3.0% | -0.2% | 3.0% | 3.0% | 3.0% | 3.0% | |
| Increase (actual***) | 12,637.06 | $8,030.49 | ($663.38) | $8,376.43 | $8,627.72 | $8,886.55 | $9,285.31 |
* Complete 2021 usage data not available until
2022.
**Projected materials budget after 2021 based on flat budget.
***Actual increase does
not equate to contractual rate of increase due to journal title transfers in and out of collection.
Part of a Movement
We are part of a global movement of researchers and libraries demanding fundamental change in academic publishing, with many research funders on our side. While much of our negotiations focus on journal subscription issues, these are not the only source of concern. Monograph publishing and textbook affordability are all part of this landscape. Online textbook availability through libraries is restrictive, as others have noted, and libraries are unable to provide the kind of access that we value for our community. We believe this moment is ripe for action, and we know that working together will make us stronger.