Open Access for Research
What are Read & Publish agreements?
CQUniversity has signed what is called a "Read and Publish" Agreement with a number of publishers. Read and Publish agreements mean you (as the first author) can publish in these journals without paying the article processing charges. All Read and Publish articles are free to access and read for anyone.
We have agreements with the following publishers:
- Cambridge University Press
- CSIRO publishing
- Elsevier
- MA Healthcare
- Oxford University Press
- SAGE
- Springer Nature
- Taylor & Francis
- Wiley and Hindawi
The Read & Publish Agreements Negotiated by CAUL library guide provides an overview of all current Read & Publish agreements. For each agreement, you'll find lists of included journals and participating institutions, article eligibility types and information about the article cap limit.
How to select the highest ranking journal
When choosing an OA/hybrid publisher or journal, determining their ranking and academic standing is critical.
By using metric selection and evaluation tools like indexes and directories in your publication planning process, you can develop a short list of potential Open Access journals from the Read & Publisher agreements.
Using these tools will save you time, ensure that you avoid predatory publishers or sub-par open access journals and identify the Read & Publish Agreement journal best suited to your field of research.
| Citation indexes | Allow you to sort journals by number of citations received. | |
| Journal directories | List peer reviewed, quality controlled, open access and scholarly full text journals. |
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| Journal evaluation tools | List journal rankings, scope details and publishing information. |
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* Used to support the Open Access CQU scheme application 2022
Quartiles: Scimago Journal & Country Ranking
SCImago Journal & Country Rank (SJR) provides an easy way for you to access the Quartile ranking of open access journals.
Quartile rankings are the ranking of a journal by any database based on the impact factor (IF), citation, and indexing of that particular journal. It can divide into four different quadrants starting with Q1, Q2, Q3, and Q4.
The SCImago Journal & Country Rank (SJR) 
is a website that provides journals and country metrics based on Scopus (Elsevier) data. The SJR was developed by the SCImago Research Group. Journals can be searched for by publisher, journal name or ISSN. Each journal page provides metrics such as the journal's h-index, its SJR, Open Access level, its subject area quartile and the percentage of documents within the journal that have been cited.
1. Searching for Open Access Journals in Scimago
By selecting Journal Ranking on the homepage of Scimago all journals will be displayed from from newest uploaded to oldest.
You can then either search for a known Open Access Journal title in the search box OR select Only Open access journals and browse. Refining search features will assist you in your title search.
2. Identifying Open access journals and Quartile rankings
Open access journals can be identified by the international OA symbol, the orange unlocked padlock. Select the journal title to find out which level of Open Access (Gold, Hybrid, Green) is supported by that journal/publisher.
Quartile rankings necessary from your Open Access Journal scheme application are listed under the SJR column. Details can be found by selecting the journal title.
Information for submitting authors
The Read & Publish agreements span across numerous publishers. This means that there are different publishing stipulations and submission processes for each journal title.
The Read & Publish Agreements Negotiated by CAUL library guide provides an "Information for Authors" overview for each Read & Publish agreement.