By: Carol Baxter, Director of Publications Operations, MAA  & Paul Naish, Global Head of Portfolio for Mathematics & Statistics, Taylor & Francis @PaulNaish78

The Open Access (OA) question continues to bedevil the scientific world. How to address it and make it workable for all involved is the challenge publishers and societies face today.  Currently, a number of European countries have moved to or are moving towards fully gold (paid) open access. In recent years there has been a gradual movement from simple subscriptions or packages to some sort of updated sales package along the following lines:

"Read and Publish:" "an agreement in which the publisher received payment for reading and payment for publishing bundled into a single contract" (Hinchliffe, L.J, 2019, Scholarly Kitchen Blog, https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2019/04/23/transformative-agreements/).

"Publish and Read:" an agreement in which the publisher received payment only for publishing and reading is included for no additional cost" (Hinchliffe, L.J, 2019, Scholarly Kitchen Blog, https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2019/04/23/transformative-agreements/).

So in short Read and Publish is an agreement where institutions or larger groups/countries pay a combined fee to access subscription journals (the “Read” part) and to make all of their own authors' work immediately open access (the “publish” part). Publish and read is a deal based primarily upon open access, where access to subscription journals is included as an added benefit. 

It is important to mention a main driver of the move towards open access, Plan S (see https://www.coalition-s.org/). This is a European initiative from a consortium of research funders designed to achieve open access to all publicly-funded research.

In the US no formal plan is in place yet. Currently, any research or work done with federal funds requires the work to be made publicly available.  Robert Harrington, Associate Executive Director and Head of Publishing Division at American Mathematical Society, recently published a Primer on Open Access that provides a great place to start if you are interested in learning more about the background on these issues.

However, recently it has come to light that there is an impending US Executive Order circulating from the US Office of Science and Technology Policy that focuses on public access to federally funded research and open data. There has been no indication that this order has been signed, but it is a concern and we continue to monitor this.  Until there is a law passed on open access in the U.S., societies, and publishers will continue to grapple with OA, frequently on a case by case basis.

The MAA is in a unique position in the open-access debate. All three MAA journals are expository in nature rather than research-oriented. The vast majority of authors writing for our journals do not receive any federal money for their work. In 2019, we received five submissions to Mathematics Magazine and eight submissions to The American Mathematical Monthly from authors using federal money to fund their work.

Because we have so few federally funded submissions to our journals we are not required to make our journals immediately OA. Authors wishing to have their work published on an open-access basis currently may do so by paying an APC (article processing charge). This is the “gold” open access route where the author, institution, or funder pays for immediate open access for the Version of Record. Our journals also follow the “green” open access route where authors’ original manuscripts can be posted online immediately on a personal or departmental website, and then after 12 months on a subject repository or social scientific network.

What about the future? At some point, the MAA may be compelled to make our journals open access. At the beginning of 2018, we partnered with Taylor & Francis to help manage our three print journals and Math Horizons. They currently handle all production, printing, mailing, marketing, sales to libraries, advertising, and inventory for the three journals and Math Horizons. We have discussed possible options with Taylor & Francis concerning open access for our journals. 

Taylor & Francis has several options for the MAA to consider:  (a) converting an existing MAA journal to open access; (b) launching one or more open access journals as new additions to our member benefits, or (c) a combination of the first two. Depending on the circumstances we would likely launch one or more OA journals first, then convert existing journals at a much later date.  At this time we have no immediate plans to alter what we currently offer or how we offer it.

We are keen to ensure a sustainable structure for our future publishing, in partnership with Taylor & Francis, and we acknowledge that public access to publicly funded research is an important consideration. Critically, it is our publishing which helps MAA give so much back to our members and the wider mathematics community.

There is a lot to consider before the MAA makes a decision on the direction to take concerning open access.  It appears to be far in the future, but we are working with Taylor & Francis to stay abreast of changes as the publishing industry continues to evolve at a rapid rate.