3 Consult the Western Open Books team
If your proposal meets the Western Open Books acceptance criteria, your School Librarian will invite you to submit a WesternNow Western Open Books Advice Form (or complete this Word version of the Western Open Books Advice Form (.docx)) and email it to the Western Open Books team. They will schedule a consultation with the Scholarly Publishing Consultant who coordinates the Western Open Books projects. During this consultation, you will have the opportunity to ask questions about the publishing process. The Western Open Books team will help you determine if Western Open Books is a good fit for your publishing purpose.
Timeline
It generally takes 12 to 24 months to publish an open textbook. When considering a publishing date for your textbook, factor in around four months for the Library to process your manuscript from Library submission. The chart below outlines the major publishing stages and processes leading up to publication, including reviews (copyright, Turnitin report, peer review), copyediting, cataloguing and indexing, adding the manuscript to the Western Open Books platform (including layout and design), book cover design, Library quality checking, and promotional planning (including internal and external communications and an online book launch).
| Stage | Duration (Weeks) | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Submit the manuscript for copyright review | 4 | Copyright assessment, permissions, and author response |
| Peer review by external subject experts | 8 | External expert peer review and author revisions |
| Add the book to the Western Open Books platform | 2 | Library setup and internal metadata curation |
| Professional editing and feedback | 4 | Professional editing, second accessibility check, author revision |
| Final Library quality assurance and feedback | 2 | Quality assurance and feedback |
Layout and design support
The Digital Publishing Librarian is available to support you with any questions you have about the design of your book cover, content and the addition of media or multimedia. As you draft your manuscript in Word format, we recommend not only citing your sources and adding references but also including placemarkers (callouts) that indicate where any media or multimedia you intend to include should appear.
Next steps
If your proposal is determined to be a good fit, the Scholarly Publishing Consultant will send you an email inviting you to publish with Western Open Books. You will also be requested to complete and return the following documents to the Scholarly Publishing Consultant within the first two weeks post-consultation:
- Author Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) agreeing to the terms and conditions of the Service. All collaborators are expected to review the document, add their details, and co-sign the document.
- Student agreement to publish coursework under a Creative Commons licence. This should be completed and signed by all of your student collaborators.
You might also like to download copies of the following forms and checklists:
- OER Evaluation Checklist (Word) Use it to evaluate the suitability of openly accessible content for your project.
- *Western Open Books Open Textbook Outline (Word) template to use for your manuscript. Use Microsoft Styles to format the headings.
- OER Content Sharing (Google Docs) facilitates content sharing of your course with other academics. Consider adding these resources to the back matter of your open text resources list.
- OER Content Tracker (Excel) or *Record of Permissions (Excel) to track permissions given to use third-party content. Permission should be arranged through the University Copyright Officer.
- Download the *Inclusivity Diversity Equity Accessibility statement for Western Open Books (Word) checklists to assess the content in your open text against the criteria for accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion.
* Note: These resources are strongly recommended. Seek further advice from the Scholarly Publishing Consultant.
