Frequently Asked Questions about the SpringerNature negotiations

The University Library Director works closely with the Vice-President for Research, regularly updating UEB and the Open Research Advisory Group and makes decisions in accordance with their views.

The negotiations are sector-led involving senior academic leaders and Jisc, the UK body tasked with negotiating sector-wide deals with publishers. Sue Hartley (VP Research) and Anna Clements (Director of Library Services) sit on the representative groups governing the negotiations. Details are at www.jisc.ac.uk/springer-nature-negotiations. We are also working closely with colleagues in the Russell Group and across the N8.

Your liaison librarian is the best first point of contact. Find the librarian for your department at www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/libstaff/sllist

Where there are links to SpringerNature articles in your reading list to which we no longer have access ‘no full text online’ will be displayed. If you feel your reading list may be affected by this please contact your liaison librarian. Find the librarian for your department at www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/libstaff/sllist

Usually, no. It is good practice to link to the original article from Blackboard. If this isn’t possible contact readinglists@sheffield.ac.uk to ask about obtaining a copy that can be shared with students legally.

The interlibrary request service can be used to obtain material for research or private study and cannot be used to obtain material which is intended to be shared with others, such as students. Use the library resource recommendation form and we will try to obtain a digital copy for use in teaching. 

Yes. Journals do not take into account whether or not an author is from a subscribing institution when they consider whether or not to accept an article.

UKRI and Wellcome funded authors can continue to publish in both Springer Compact and Nature Research journals without paying an APC and be compliant with their funder's open access policy by following advice on including a licensing statement at submission and making the Author Accepted Manuscript immediately available via a repository.

Details are at sheffield.ac.uk/library/open-access/funder-policies or contact the Library team directly on OAEnquiries@sheffield.ac.uk.

UEB has also agreed that no APCs should be paid to publish OA in Nature Research hybrid journals (not currently included in our open access deal) from any institutional funding source or using funds from research councils. There may be open access funds at faculty and/or departmental level but we would ask all staff to consider whether paying an APC of €9k+ is a good use of money, especially as such spending will undermine the University’s negotiating position.

Yes. In principle there is no reason why a ‘no deal’ should affect your position as a peer reviewer.

In principle there is no reason why a ‘no deal’ should affect your position on a SpringerNature editorial board. The decision to appoint and retain an individual on a board should be made on entirely academic grounds and there is no requirement that an individual be employed by an institution that subscribes or that they subscribe themselves (more here). 

SpringerNature may contact Sheffield authors and those with positions on editorial boards and ask you to put pressure on us to renew the deal. This assumption is based on what has happened at other institutions and previous experience with other publishers. We would be interested in hearing from you if this happens. If you’re unsure whether to respond or how to respond please talk to us.

It’s worth noting that, in the event that we don’t reach an agreement, we will still have instant access to most SpringerNature titles through post-cancellation access agreements (back to 2012) and open access initiatives. A search in StarPlus will show whether we have full text access or not.

The LibKey Nomad browser extension flags up open access journal articles, as well as articles we subscribe to, when you’re browsing the web. You can download and install it on your computer for free from the LibKey Nomad webpage.

Yes, where Sheffield has access to the full text of an article this will be displayed in the results you get from a search in StarPlus. StarPlus provides an option to include articles where we don’t have full text access in your results too. Select the ‘include results without full text online access’ from the filters to display details of material to which we do not have access.

Firstly, it’s worth double-checking in StarPlus whether we have access to the full text or not. If it’s clear we don’t, you have several options:

1. A freely available, open access copy may exist. The Library provides access to the LibKey Nomad browser extension which will flag up open access journal articles, as well as articles we subscribe to, when you’re browsing the web. You can download and install it on your computer from the LibKey Nomad webpage.
2. If the article is required for your research or private study you can ask us to obtain a copy for you via the interlibrary request service.
3. If the article is required for teaching, i.e. to share with students, use the library resource recommendation form and we will try to obtain a digital copy for use in teaching
4. Contact the author. The Open Access button from OA.Works has a ‘contact the author’ service. Many publishers allow authors to share their own articles responsibly and authors will often willingly share their final manuscript with you. ResearchGate and Academia.edu are other sharing sites where authors may have made work available.

Any items with a DOI or a URL will no longer take you to the full text. See the previous question for alternative access arrangements.

We are building a clearer picture of usage and activities with SpringerNature across our institution. Our team of liaison librarians can assess impact at departmental level and will provide more information on request. Find the librarian for your department at www.sheffield.ac.uk/library/libstaff/sllist.

In the event of a subscription cancellation most requirements for journal access will be satisfied through post-cancellation access agreements to published material back to 2012 or through articles which are open access. You can search for these in StarPlus. If this isn’t the case we have mechanisms in place to request material for research or for teaching. For other requirements please talk to the librarian for your department.

It is possible to take out a personal subscription to a SpringerNature journal and many academic colleagues do this in areas of personal interest. However, activity of this kind may undermine our attempts to reach a reasonable deal with the publisher for the institution. Some departments have devoted funds to individual titles or subject specific databases, often where an institutional licence would be prohibitive. That said, it is worth considering whether this approach is generalisable. We know that if all academic colleagues took out individual or departmental subscriptions this would result in increased access costs overall.

Our current deal ended on 31 December 2022. SpringerNature has assured us of a grace period to the end of February 2023, after which we expect access will continue whilst negotiations are ongoing. It’s worth noting that we have perpetual access to most journal titles back to 2012 as part of our contract with SpringerNature.

Jisc is working on behalf of all UK HEIs to successfully negotiate a new deal with SpringerNature and each institution will be making similar preparations to Sheffield. More widely, institutions regularly negotiate deals and SPARC provides an overview of ‘big deal’ decisions.