Library News

Who owns knowledge? Reclaiming publishing as part of the scholarly mission

By Francine May, Erik Christiansen, & Joel Blechinger

Each October, International Open Access Week invites us to pause and ask an important question. This year’s theme, “Who Owns Our Knowledge” (October 20-26, 2025), challenges universities, publishers, and scholars to critically examine how knowledge is created, shared, and controlled.

More and more, commercial interests are shaping how we publish, track, and even read research. In this environment, communities like ours at MRU are working to reassert ownership of the knowledge we produce. The movement towards open access, community-led journals and open infrastructure offers a path forward. 

This piece highlights how MRU scholars are using open publishing to retain ownership of their work and share it widely, while our librarians are helping make it easier to adopt open access practices, keep up with new trends, and find support when needed.

Why reclaiming ownership matters

A primary driver for open publishing is that it makes academic research freely available to the public, but commercial structures have made it costly and uneven. 

• Copyright transfers: Many publishers require exclusive licenses, limiting how authors can reuse or share their own (often publicly funded) work
• Double payment: Universities pay subscription fees, and increasingly, additional article processing charges (APCs) - which are regularly over $3,000 and up to $50,000 CAD - to make a single piece of research open (Haustein et al, 2024). On top of this, universities often fund the salaries and lab spaces that support the research
• Equity gaps: High APCs exclude researchers without grant support, deepening global inequities in who gets to publish and be read

Highlighting how concentrated the open publishing market has become, just six publishers collected over $8 billion USD in APCs between 2019 and 2023, with the highest fees being charged by hybrid journals (those that are still behind paywalls). Hybrid journals had a mean charge of just over $6,000, while fully open access journals had a mean charge of just over $4,000 (Haustein et al, 2024; Coalition-S, 2024). These fees lack transparency, in that it is not clear how or if those fees support publishing costs. 

Berkesand, P. (2021). Organizing and launching a scholarly open access journal. Linköping University Press. https://doi.org/10.3384/9789179296490. CC-BY 4.0. Diagram outlining the different types of Open Access publishing models.

How can we shift the system?

Open access to knowledge advances the public good. Freely shared knowledge fuels innovation, informed decision-making, and public trust in science, while reducing barriers for under-resourced institutions and communities often excluded by high publishing and subscriptions costs. While not all information can or should be openly shared - for reasons such as privacy, cultural protocols, or participant consent - most research can be shared in some form, and doing so broadens who benefits from it.

As open access broadens participation in scholarly work, it remains essential that platforms retain a commitment to academic quality, rigorous standards of peer review, transparent methodologies and responsible conduct of research. While Mount Royal University does not control most publishing platforms, except those it directly maintains or supports, it encourages faculty to evaluate publication venues critically and to be able to articulate the rationale for their choices. In alignment with the Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications, Mount Royal University is committed to maintaining high standards while promoting open access. Scholars are encouraged to seek support from the Library (as outlined below), their Faculty (through Associate and Vice Deans of Research), and the Associate Vice President of Research, Scholarship and Community Engagement when navigating the dynamic publishing landscape.

Reinvest in community-owned publishing

At MRU: Scholars such as Antoine Eche & Justine Huet (Convergence francophones), Michelle Yeo and colleagues (Imagining SoTL), Samanti Kulatilake and colleagues (Ancient Lanka) edit diamond open-access journals which don’t charge to read or publish. These scholar-led models keep publishing costs transparent, sustain multilingual and community-based scholarship, and ensure that decisions about how knowledge is used, shared, and accessed, stays where it belongs, with the scholarly community - while keeping the knowledge freely available to readers. 

Strengthen local and collective infrastructure

Libraries and consortia can build and maintain community-based systems, repositories, platforms, and data services that keep ownership within the public sphere.

At MRU: MRU scholars are increasingly using open repositories, such as Mount Royal’s MROAR and Data Repository and shared platforms such as Open Context, figshare and OSF, to share research and workflows, supporting transparency and collaboration across disciplines. Apoorve Chokshi and Patrick Perri, with Librarian Richard Hayman, led the shift to make the Western Canadian Conference on Computing Education (WCCCE) open. Previously accessible only through a subscription publisher, the 2025 proceedings, hosted at Mount Royal University, are now freely available.

Creative writing anthologies co-created by Natalie Meisner and Aida Patient in partnership with Immigrant Services Calgary bring together MRU creative writing students and immigrant seniors to share stories that might otherwise be lost. Many other MRU faculty are also self-archiving versions of their manuscripts in MROAR through green open access, demonstrating how MRU scholars are reclaiming ownership of their work and ensuring it remains accessible for the long term. Together, these efforts help secure lasting, equitable access to publications and datasets created on campus, extending the reach and impact of MRU research.

Value openness in research assessment

The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA, 2012) urges institutions to evaluate research based on its quality, transparency, and contribution, not journal prestige. It also calls for recognizing a diversity of research outputs and mentoring activities that contribute to scholarship and community.

At MRU: Our teaching-focused research culture already models this shift. Faculty such as Aliyah Dosani (Schools of Nursing & Midwifery), Meg Wilcox (Journalism & Digital Media), Nadine Van Wyk (Health & Physical Education), Trevor Day (Biology), and Sarah Hewitt (Biology) demonstrate how diverse scholarly and creative output, from open publications and student training/collaborations, to public storytelling and science communication, extend the reach of research beyond academia. Connie Van der Byl (Research, Scholarship & Community Engagement) and colleagues led the conversation to have MRU formally endorse DORA earlier this year and continue discussions on how the university can strengthen its commitment to responsible, inclusive research assessment - helping broaden research assessment to include more than just metrics and ensure that real-world impact, mentorship, and openness, also drive recognition.

Retain rights and publish on your own terms

Authors can ensure their work can be widely accessed and shared by understanding publishing agreements and taking advantage of sharing options. Ideally, they retain copyright and publish under open licenses to maximize visibility and reuse.

At MRU: Sara Smith and Jon Mee (Biology, Faculty of Science and Technology) model open and reproducible science through transparent data, accessible publications, and student collaboration. Both publish in open access journals such as PeerJ, Molecular Biology and Evolution, and Methods in Ecology and Evolution, and share preprints, datasets, and code through platforms like bioRxiv, Zenodo, Dryad, and GitHub. They regularly involve students as co-authors and mentees, helping the next generation of researchers engage with open, verifiable science. Their work demonstrates how retaining rights and sharing data openly strengthens reproducibility, credibility, and public trust in research.

Support collective models of openness

Community-owned models such as Diamond Open Access (no charge to read or publish) and Subscribe to Open (S2O) show that publishing can be open, equitable, and sustainable when supported collectively rather than commercially.

At MRU: Through participation in national initiatives like the CRKN–Érudit Partnership for Open Access and contributions to open publishing platforms (e.g. Public Knowledge Project, Open Education Alberta), MRU Library helps sustain the shared infrastructure that allows researchers here, and across Canada, to publish openly without prohibitive cost. 

Convergences francophones and Imagining SoTL are supported through journal support grants from Érudit and CRKN - institutions in turn supported by MRU Library. This model keeps publishing costs transparent, supports multilingual scholarship, and sustains community ownership of knowledge.

How the library can help

Taking back ownership of knowledge starts with knowing your options.

Plan early
Connect with your subject librarian while you’re planning your publication, if possible before confirming acceptance (to maximize options). We can help you identify open publishing options that fit your goals and your discipline and help you avoid getting locked into closed models.

Publish and share openly
Make your work freely available by depositing it in MROAR, MRU’s open institutional repository, or in Borealis, the national data repository or in another disciplinary repository. If you are limited by a publisher agreement we can help you determine what version of your article can be deposited and when in compliance with your publisher’s policies. We can also help you find APC-free publishing options. If your chosen journal charges article processing fees, we can advise on waived or discounted APCs using the Open Access Fee & Journal Finder, and, if eligible, direct you to MRU’s Open Access Fund.

Understand and retain your rights
When signing a publishing agreement, know what you are agreeing to. Librarians can walk you through key terms, direct you to resources on publishing contracts and help you choose open licenses (such as Creative Commons) that let you keep copyright and enable others to read, reuse, and cite your work.

Share beyond journals
We can help you publish and preserve conference materials, publications stemming from community partnerships, audio recordings, preprints, data and more, ensuring permanent, equitable access to diverse types of scholarship. We can also advise on tools like OSF (Open Science Framework) or other disciplinary repositories that support open research best practices.

To explore any of these opportunities - or to discuss where to start - contact your subject librarian. A full list by area of expertise is available at https://library.mtroyal.ca/contacts

Taking back ownership

This year’s Open Access Week theme reminds us that knowledge isn’t a commodity; it’s a shared human achievement. Many MRU scholars are already leading in this area, showing that openness is more than a publishing choice; it’s part of a collective movement to take back ownership of knowledge and make it work for the public good.

By supporting open publishing models, scholar-led journals, and open infrastructure, the MRU community is helping to build a system where knowledge remains owned by those who create it and choose how it’s shared - while ensuring it is freely available for others to access, learn from and build upon. 

When knowledge is open, everyone benefits.

References

DORA (Declaration on Research Assessment). (2012). San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment. https://sfdora.org/read/

Haustein, S., Schares, E., Alperin, J. P., Hare, M., Butler, L.-A., & Schönfelder, N. (2024). Estimating global article processing charges paid to six publishers for open access between 2019 and 2023 [Preprint]. arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.16551

cOAlition S. (2024). Journal Comparison Service: Analysis of the 2022 data. https://www.coalition-s.org/blog/journal-comparison-service-analysis-of-the-2022-data

Open Access Network. (2025, June 10). Green, gold, and diamond open access. https://open-access.network/en/information/open-access-primers/green-and-gold

Acknowledgements

We’d like to thank Meagan Bowler, Brian Jackson, Cari Merkley, Sara Sharun, Connie Van der Byl, and Trent Warner for providing examples and feedback on this article.