A new spend category in Workday Finance will allow UVA to collect high-quality data on publishing charges, which are expected to increase due to a 2022 federal ruling requiring the open flow of federally-funded scientific information.
The government mandate will require agencies using federal research dollars to make any research findings available to the public in a free and open format by the end of 2025. For UVA faculty and researchers, this could mean significant increases in "article processing charges" or APCs, from many publishers.
Donna Tolson, Associate Dean for Administration at the University of Virginia Library, championed the creation of the new spend category, in order to track the new fees. After consulting with budget's Katie Walker and a group of associate deans for administration, Tolson submitted her request to Ask Finance and worked with Jacob Mair's group to set up the new spend category.
"Being able to track processing charges will show us which publishers we're paying, whether APCs are increasing, and where the money is coming from, whether it's grants, start-ups, or operations. That will put us in a stronger position to support faculty and to negotiate with publishers if APC rates increase as a result of this new ruling," says Tolson.
The new spend category has been set up as Services Article Processing Charges (SC0792).