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Policies for Faculty Publications

AFIT - Institutional Repository Policies

1. Copyright Policies

AFIT’s institutional repository (IR) is unique in that works created by the federal government are not copyrightable but considered part of the public domain. (See Frequently Asked Questions About Copyright for explanations and exceptions.) However, as employees of an academic institution, some AFIT members publish academic works in journals that have copyright protection. In those instances, digital materials that meet the contributor and copyright guidelines may still be submitted for inclusion in the IR.

  1. Contributors must ensure that they have obtained the appropriate copyright permissions when they are not the copyright holder for items submitted to the AFIT institutional repository.
  2. If contributor transferred copyright to another entity without retaining these rights, then they must seek permission of the copyright holder unless the use is of one of statutory exemption in copyright laws. For further information, see:
    1. Open Policy Finder database of copyright terms for publishers, and acceptable uses in institutional repositories. (Previously called Sherpa)
    2. Copyright law on government works.
    3. Creative Commons licenses, particularly the Attribution License (CC BY 4.0 International)
  3. Contributors do not transfer copyrights when submitting to the AFIT repository, but rather license the right for the AFIT repository to provide access to their scholarly materials.

2. Rights and Responsibilities

Responsibilities of a contributor to the AFIT Institutional Repository

  • Ensure that he/she holds the copyright for items submitted or has obtained appropriate copyright permission for items submitted when he/she is not the copyright holder
  • Ensure that the items submitted meet submission guidelines

Rights of a contributor to the AFIT Institutional Repository

  • Copyright for a work is retained by copyright holder and does not revert to the D’Azzo Research Library, AFIT institutional repository.

Responsibilities of the D’Azzo Research Library

  • Retain and maintain content submitted to the AFIT institutional repository
  • Preserve content and notify contributors of any significant changes to formats and platforms.
  • If AFIT and/or BePress cease to support the AFIT institutional repository, the library will return the digital content/collections to the contributors and transfer the content to University Archives for consideration collections of departments that have ceased to exist

Rights of the D’Azzo Research Library

  • Redistribute or amend metadata for items in the AFIT institutional repository
  • Refuse or de-accession items or collections under certain circumstances as outlined in the Withdrawal Policy statement
  • Move content to reflect current University structure or format

3. Submission Guidelines

  • The AFIT Institutional Repository is open to contributions from faculty, students, or staff of AFIT.
  • All submissions must clear Public Affairs.
  • For most format types, individual files should be less than 1GB. File types may include the following: JPG, PNG, XLS, and other common extensions.
  • All text files should be converted to PDF by the contributor. Non-text files may be made available as uploaded.
  • Theses and dissertations will be submitted to the repository through the Theses Processing Center on a quarterly basis. Please see Appendix A of this policy, on specific policy for Theses and Dissertations.
  • Those contributing other material will complete a submission form and agree to policies set forth on the form. The submission will be reviewed by repository staff to ensure that guidelines have been met before posting.
  • Updated versions and revisions of content may be submitted and can be linked to the original posted version.
  • The AFIT Library Staff will add works to the respective collections, and also tag works for inclusion in the special collections for the Centers and research topics. Additions by the Library will be made in accordance with these policies and guidance statements.
  • Duplicate submissions will be merged to an existing record for that work, if there are any new elements. Otherwise, the duplicate will be refused and declined.
  • Submitted materials must be scholarly, educational, or research oriented including:
    • Theses and Dissertations
    • Preprint or author generated articles/papers
    • Institutional Publications such as Annual Reports, Fact Book publications
    • Conference papers/posters
    • Technical papers and reports
    • Videos
    • Datasets connected to published works also in the AFIT institutional repository.
    • Archival material
  • Submissions that fail to meet contributor, copyright, or quality policies will be rejected. Contributors may resubmit files when all policies have been followed to the satisfaction of repository staff.

4. Withdrawals or Revisions

For Theses and Dissertation withdrawals, please see Section A-4 of the Appendix.

The IR is meant to be a permanent scholarly record, and once a file is deposited in the repository, a citation to the paper will always remain. Removing content is discouraged. However, authors may request that the files be removed or revised.

Withdrawals: Accepted Reasons for withdrawal may include copyright infringement, plagiarism, or falsification of data. The requestor must submit a request to the AFIT institutional repository administrators.

The AFIT institutional repository staff must approve all withdrawals.

  • As a permanent scholarly record, the withdrawn file will no longer be accessible. The file of the document (and any errata / supplements) will be removed from access. The record page on the AFIT institutional repository will remain, unless there is a security concern with the metadata of that work.

5. Preservation Policy

The AFIT institutional repository staff uses standard data management practices to protect items stored in the repository. The database is backed up regularly and is kept secure against deletion or unauthorized modification. Additionally, each digital file will be placed into a digital archive on an approved cloud platform, accessible to D’Azzo Research Library staff.

Although the AFIT institutional repository staff is committed to preserving and providing access to all of the content in the repository, some file formats may cease to be supported as a result of changes in technology beyond our control. Files in some formats may no longer function on advanced computer equipment and become unusable.

In addition, AFIT may determine that our current AFIT institutional repository platform no longer meets the needs of our community. Should this happen, and where possible, staff will attempt to migrate all files to a new platform and continue to provide access to the content.

Appendix A. IR Policies for Electronic Theses and Dissertations

“Thesis” or “theses” may be used to encompass theses and dissertations.

A-1. Submission and Publication of Theses and Dissertations

From Academic Year 2023 (starting 01 October 2022), thesis and dissertation works will be posted on the AFIT institutional repository when all of these conditions are met for that work.

  • 365 days from the latest committee approval signature on the thesis/dissertation.
    • PhDs must have the EN Dean signature
  • Clearance case number and completed PA case date are shown in the student folder in the TPC directory.
  • DTIC accession number is issued
  • Marked with a Distribution A statement with no copyright holds.

During the 365 day embargo of a new thesis or dissertation, a record page will be made after the work is cleared by 88th ABW/PA and any other necessary units. That record page may contain the title, author, degree, date, department, research advisor, AFIT designator, and the abstract. The abstract will be sourced from the AF298 form for that work. Any special notations may be transposed from the corresponding text in the abstract of the work itself. For instance, H2O for H2O, or 3 x 1014 for 3 x 1014.

Once the work has passed its embargo period, the PDF of the thesis will be added to the record.

All Personally Identifiable Information (PII) detected in the acknowledgements, dedication, or “CV” pages of a thesis will be redacted by marks or page omissions, as the repository administrators deem necessary. A comment on any page omission will be added by the Admins to the record page on The AFIT institutional repository. For instance, “The CV page of this work is omitted to protect personal information.”

A-2. Submitting Supplemental Data and Code.

Theses records may have supplemental materials outside the page range of their main work. A supplement can be added onto the thesis record as an additional file, provided that it has PA clearance and written approval of the graduate’s academic department to include.

A-3. Thesis Errata Policy - Revision and Correction Requests.

Material in the Theses and Dissertations collection is considered to be a record of completed work, and in most cases may not be edited after publication.

Once certified by the thesis supervisor and committee*, and transferred to DTIC, all thesis/dissertation content becomes part of the formal record.

In rare cases, exceptions may be made to correct substantial problems in an thesis that affect its content. Published theses and dissertations are generally not corrected for misspellings or typographical errors. Please send all requests for corrections to the AFIT institutional repository Administrators. AFIT.ENWL.Repository@us.af.mil

As stated above in the main policy, acceptable amendments, corrections or replacement documents would be put into the record as an errata, a distinct file in addition to the original. A comment will be placed in the record to help readers locate the updated material.

A-4. Withdrawal of a thesis/dissertation.

As a permanent record, the ETD will remain on the repository unless there is direction from the Department Head of the respective graduate, or from the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs or Dean of the Graduate School to remove a thesis file from the repository.

  • The file of the document (and any errata / supplements) will be removed from access. ETD record page on The AFIT institutional repository will remain, unless there is a security concern with the metadata of that work.
  • Works may be removed for the purposes of plagiarism, copyright infringement, falsification of data, or to mitigate a DOD security concern.
  • Removal of a document from The AFIT institutional repository will have no influence on the work’s remaining inclusion in DTIC. The IR administrators do not process requests for mutual removal from DTIC.
  • Removal of a document from The AFIT institutional repository will have no influence on the work’s remaining inclusion in any harvesting site like ResearchGate, OCLC, or Google. The IR administrators do not process requests for mutual withdrawal from any other site.

A-5. For further information:

All inquiries may reach the AFIT institutional repository administrators at AFIT.ENWL.Repository@us.af.mil