Open Access Publishing Fund

Only Mason-affiliated authors are eligible to apply for funding through the OAPF (see below for details).

The total limit awarded to an applicant for this fiscal year is $2,000.

Fees are pro-rated for multi-authored articles. That is, if more than one author from Mason applies for funding support for the same article, the article processing fee will be divided equally, up to the $2,000 per applicant cap.

For an article co-authored by Mason and non-Mason contributors, funding would be limited to the proportion of Mason to unaffiliated co-authors on the paper, up to $2,000 per Mason-affiliated applicant. For example, a paper with five total contributors, two of whom are Mason-affiliated, would be awarded 2/5ths of the total APC. For an APC of $5,000, the total OAPF award would be $2,000, or $1,000 for each of the two Mason-affiliated co-authors.

An applicant is limited to one Fund award during the course of this fiscal year. 

An OAPF application is submitted by one single applicant. The applicant may request funds on behalf of GMU co-authors who have not already received an OAPF award in this FY.

If that same applicant is subsequently a co-author on a subsequent article, their GMU-qualified co-author would not be disqualified for applying on the basis of that article.

Financial support is on a first-come, first-served basis. Funds are not distributed according to an individual’s affiliation with a particular school, college, or department at Mason. Nor is it the intention of this fund to endorse specific OA publishers or publications.

Note: Authors not affiliated with Mason are not supported. Consequently, a publisher’s invoice must indicate what portion of the fee George Mason University will be paying on behalf of the submitting Mason author; this is a Virginia state accounting requirement.

Who is eligible?

• Mason faculty (term, research, tenure-stream, or tenured)
  • Adjunct supported if at least one co-author is a tenure-stream, Mason faculty member
• Graduate students
• Post-doctoral fellows

An individual meeting the above criteria whose article has been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed open access journal in which the article is immediately available online is eligible to apply.