The Canadian Research Knowledge Network Announces Transformative Agreement with SAGE

February 23, 2021

Today, the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) is pleased to announce that we have reached our first transformative open access agreement with SAGE. The agreement, which includes 69 participating CRKN members, increases open access options for Canadian researchers. Through the agreement, authors affiliated with participating CRKN institutions may now publish their articles as open access with no Article Processing Charge (APC) in over 900 SAGE Choice journals. In addition, the agreement includes a 40% discount on APCs in SAGE’s gold open access journals. To facilitate open access publishing, processing of the APC waiver for SAGE Choice journals and the discount for gold open access journals is done automatically via the SAGE Open Access Portal when corresponding authors identify themselves as affiliated with a participating CRKN institution. A Creative Commons license CC BY will be applied to open access publications unless a different license is requested by the author.

The agreement includes a total price increase of 6% over three years to cover the costs of open access publishing that were not accounted for in previous agreements and are often paid through funding grants or discretionary funding at universities. “The goal is to identify these fractured sources of revenue and negotiate a cost-neutral agreement based on the full amount of revenue a publisher receives from Canada,” says Clare Appavoo, Executive Director, CRKN. This approach is echoed in CRKN’s recently updated Licensing Principles which indicate that sustainable paths to open access will be prioritized and which identifies that transformative agreements are a temporary transitional means to achieve open access.

“We celebrate the SAGE agreement not simply because it is a transformative agreement, but because it represents an essential step in transitioning to fully open access agreements,” says Dr. Guylaine Beaudry, Vice-Provost, Digital Strategy and University Librarian, Concordia University, and Chair of the Content Strategy Committee. “Throughout the lifecycle of the agreement, we will continue to collect publishing and usage data to evaluate the success of the agreement and to inform future agreements,” continues Dr. Beaudry. “This transformative agreement with SAGE indicates our commitment to increasing open access options, while continuing to reduce license fees for our members, as much as possible, in our agreements with large commercial journal publishers.”

“The real success of this agreement is how we continue to work together as a Canadian community to meet our shared goals of transforming scholarly communications,” says Ms. Appavoo. “The open access components of the SAGE agreement will make a significant contribution to the discoverability of Canadian research output.”

In addition to the open access components of the agreement, the SAGE agreement also includes increased access to additional SAGE content, such as the journals of the Royal Society of Medicine and Institution of Mechanical Engineers, for all participating CRKN institutions. Journals, both newly launched and acquired by SAGE each year, are included at no additional cost.

More information regarding the SAGE agreement is available on the CRKN website.

Participating Institutions

Acadia University

Algoma University

Athabasca University

Bishop's University

Brandon University

Brock University

Cape Breton University

Carleton University

Concordia University

Concordia University of Edmonton

Dalhousie University

HEC Montréal

Kwantlen Polytechnic University

Lakehead University

MacEwan University

McGill University

McMaster University

Memorial University of Newfoundland

Mount Allison University

Mount Royal University

Mount Saint Vincent University

Nipissing University

OCAD University

Queen's University

Royal Roads University

Ryerson University

Saint Mary's University

Simon Fraser University

St. Francis Xavier University

Thompson Rivers University

Trent University

Trinity Western University

Université Laval

Université de Moncton

Université de Montréal

Université du Québec :

École de technologie supérieure

École nationale d’administration publique

Institut national de la recherche scientifique

Télé-université du Québec

Université du Québec à Chicoutimi

Université du Québec à Montréal

Université du Québec en Outaouais

Université du Québec à Rimouski

Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières

Université Sainte-Anne

Université de Sherbrooke

University of Alberta

University of British Columbia

University of Calgary

University of the Fraser Valley

University of Guelph

University of Lethbridge

University of Manitoba

University of New Brunswick

University of Northern British Columbia

University of Ontario Institute of Technology

University of Ottawa

University of Prince Edward Island

University of Regina

University of Saskatchewan

University of Toronto

University of Waterloo

University of Windsor

University of Victoria

University of Winnipeg

Vancouver Island University

Western University

Wilfrid Laurier University

York University