Academic Communities and SelectedWorks Profiles - Guidelines
Every college and academic department at Eastern Illinois University has a Digital Commons community page in The Keep. This community page holds collections for the unit’s faculty scholarship and creative activity, newsletters and other publications, highlighted student honors work, master’s theses, and more. Specialized collections, such as the Biological Science’s Stover-Ebinger Herbarium Specimens collection, are sometimes also added. Library Services staff check copyright permissions for items published elsewhere.
Items appropriate for inclusion in an academic community page include the above examples of collections, as well as original unpublished content produced by EIU faculty or students, such as open educational resources, or archival collections documenting institution-sanctioned events such as Commencement or Years of Service Awards. Content must have at least one author, sponsor, creator, or unit affiliated with Eastern Illinois University. Student work must be faculty-reviewed and sponsored. Specialized collections may be added at the discretion of Library Services. Deposited materials are intended to be permanent contributions to the repository, and in most cases, freely available to the public as open access items.
EIU-affiliated faculty, administrators, and emeritus may request an individual SelectedWorks profile page that contains their contact, education, professional affiliations/awards, and courses taught information, as well as examples of their research, scholarship, and teaching. Items included are copyright checked by Library Services Scholarly Communication staff. Persons that leave employment with EIU retain access and control of their SelectedWorks profile page. Legacy pages remain public but not updated nor associated with expert galleries in The Keep. Persons interested in having their SelectedWorks profile page set up should email thekeep@eiu.edu and include their vita and a brief paragraph about themselves/their research interests.
Contribution of Content
We invite submission and/or discussion of possibilities for submission of scholarly content produced on campus and appropriate for widespread dissemination via open access, with an eye toward creative solutions, potential referrals if/when other platforms are better suited, and in keeping with the continued advancement of technology and scholarly content. The Library Services Scholarly Communication unit regularly recruits archival and academic unit content, as well as harvesting faculty scholarship into SelectedWorks profiles pages. Content added to SelectedWorks may, at Library Services’ discretion, also be added to Academic Communities faculty research pages in The Keep. Faculty may request content to be added or updated by emailing thekeep@eiu.edu and including an attached vita and/or the content to include. Submitting the request for inclusion does not guarantee that works can be added, due to copyright and permissions considerations. Faculty providing relevant Copyright Transfer Agreement(s) with their request will expedite the submission process. Persons with a SelectedWorks profile page are welcome to self-submit, however Library staff reserves the right to remove content that is a copyright or privacy violation. For documents that are uploaded by library staff, every effort is made to redact personal signatures.
Master’s theses are self-submit digitally deposited in The Keep. The thesis author must follow the submission guidelines and pay the $25 deposit fee. Theses submissions will be reviewed by the thesis committee chair for publishing approval prior to publication. Thesis committee chair approval is required for either published or embargoed theses and for graduation.
Examples of Appropriate Content
Appropriate content for The Keep includes but is not limited to published articles from scholarly journals, “grey” literature such as supplemental content for book chapters or working papers, book chapters, research datasets, administration documents, conference papers, open educational resources, and faculty-reviewed student work such as honors theses and master’s theses. Multimedia files such as videos, audio files, and posters can also be accepted. We cannot accept websites, live databases, or computer programs.
Journal and Book Publishing – Guidelines
Digital Commons, the platform that The Keep is built upon, originated as an online publishing platform. This makes The Keep a good candidate for hosting EIU-affiliated journals and books. The Keep hosts academic journals such as the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy, The Councilor: A Journal of the Social Studies, and the Journal of Health Education, Research, and Applied Practice. Open Access textbooks developed by EIU faculty as open educational resources may also be published via The Keep.
Hosted journals can have their own customized design journal site, and editors are able to use a built-in editorial system called EdiKit. Library Services Scholarly Communication staff can assist faculty with setting up a hosted journal and learning the EdiKit system. Journals hosted by The Keep are search engine optimized, so their content is more discoverable via Google and other search engines.
Any hosted journal or open access textbook that is sponsored by an EIU faculty, unit, or student organization, and that produces scholarly, intellectual, or creative academic output, may consider The Keep as an avenue for publishing. An EIU-affiliated faculty member, administrator, emeritus, or unit must have editorial or managerial oversight of the publication in order to be considered. Editors must commit to learning the Digital Commons interface and to posting content and managing their hosted journal site. Library Services Scholarly Communication staff are available to assist with questions.
Favorable reasons for publishing your journal or open access textbook via The Keep include the content being freely available as open access; an existing publication in need of a digital platform or new platform for publishing; a journal, book, or publication with an editor or sponsor associated with EIU; serial publications of EIU departments, units, or faculty-reviewed student organizations/content.
Contribution of Content
Persons interested in publishing via The Keep should contact thekeep@eiu.edu to discuss possibilities. Library Services Scholarly Communication staff will meet with you to ascertain your publication’s scope and needs and determine if being hosted via The Keep is a good fit. Once a journal or publication is accepted for publication, Library Services will work with the publication sponsors on site design, set up, EdiKit training, and will be available for consultations. Library staff are not responsible for article layout and formatting for journals published on The Keep platform.
Examples of Appropriate Content
Publications appropriate for hosting via The Keep include peer-reviewed academic journals edited by EIU faculty/administrators/emeritus; faculty-reviewed and sponsored student organization publications with an academic focus; serials/newsletters/annual reports produced by EIU units; textbooks written or edited by EIU faculty; scholarly books written by EIU faculty/administrators/emeritus.
Conferences and Event Management - Guidelines
The Keep is able to host conference and event sites appropriate to EIU-affiliated or EIU-sponsored symposia, conferences, and events. The Keep’s conference template provides a full workflow that allows for submission of proposals, peer review, scheduling of sessions, and content publication. Like other content hosted by The Keep, conference and event sites are search engine optimized for better discoverability via Google and other search engines. Conference sites can feature the schedule of events and registration information.
Any event or conference that produces academic output, and is affiliated with or sponsored by an EIU faculty, administrator, emeritus, or student organization, may consider The Keep for hosting a conference or event site. To be approved, a person with responsibility for the event must be affiliated with EIU and commit to learning the Digital Commons event template interface for posting content.
Contribution of Content
EIU-affiliated persons or organizations interested in utilizing The Keep as a platform for hosting their conference or event should contact Library Services Scholarly Communication staff at thekeep@eiu.edu to discuss the possibilities. Library Services staff will meet with you to determine the scope, nature, and needs of the conference/event. Once a conference/event is accepted for hosting, Library Services staff will work with the event organizer(s) to design and set up the event site and training for using the interface. Library Services staff will be available for questions/trouble shooting/assistance, but event organizer(s) are responsible for posting content.
Examples of Appropriate Content
Events that may be appropriate for hosting via The Keep include academic events/conferences held on campus and sponsored by EIU-affiliated persons or units; Symposia highlighting EIU faculty or student scholarship; Exhibits sponsored by Library Services or another EIU unit; Regularly occurring lecture series sponsored by an EIU-affiliated faculty, administrator, emeritus, department, center, faculty-sponsored student organization, or scholarly organization or publication.
Image Galleries – Guidelines
The Keep’s image gallery template provides a way for EIU faculty, staff, and students to prominently showcase visual collections. Galleries can include photos, artwork, digitized images, and visual archival documents. Images in The Keep are search engine optimized with appropriate metadata, enhancing discoverability via Google and other search engines.
Image galleries in The Keep are generally used to present an online exhibit of visually oriented materials, archival documentation of official EIU events such as sponsored receptions and Commencement ceremonies, or exhibit programming. Image collections of student organizations may be considered at the discretion of Library Services; however, they usually require faculty review and sponsorship.
Archival or publishing-quality images should be in tiff format and 400-600 pixels per inch (ppi). Access (downloadable) images may be in jpeg, gif, tiff, bmp, or png file format and should be 200-400 ppi. These guidelines follow the CARLI Consortium “Guidelines for Creation of Digital Collections.” Images hosted in The Keep are presented in downloadable “access copy” resolution format. Archival/publishing-quality tiffs are preserved on EIU servers. Requests for availability of publication-quality archived images should be directed to thekeep@eiu.edu.
Contribution of Content
EIU-affiliated faculty, administrators, emeritus, staff, or faculty-sponsored student organizations may submit image collections to The Keep for publication consideration by contacting Library Services Scholarly Communication staff at thekeep@eiu.edu. Sponsors take responsibility for all permissions for posting of the images. Submitted images should be high quality resolution appropriate for potential publication. Library Services staff will upload the content for you, using the metadata you provide. Images can be displayed as a list or in a grid, and also presented as a Slideshow or Content Carousel (an example of the latter can be seen here.)
Examples of Appropriate Content
Images appropriate for inclusion in The Keep include official EIU event photos, archival photos, EIU faculty or student artwork, exhibit programming events, exhibits, and faculty-sponsored student organization event photos.
