Part of
Virginia Tech Publishing (VTP) produces a variety of publications for the university community, including scholarly, educational, student, and general-interest works. Everything published by VTP is vetted for quality. Scholarly and educational works are peer reviewed according to the standards described below; general-interest works undergo an internal vetting process; and student publications are evaluated by the originating department or class instructor.
Books published under the VTP imprint include scholarly, educational, general-interest, and student-authored books. Due to this variety in genre, audience, and purpose, VTP uses different criteria and methods in its evaluation process. All scholarly books presenting original research follow the best practices in peer review as set forth by the Association of University Presses. A peer review statement in the book (usually on the copyright page) describes the specific practices followed. General-interest books undergo an internal vetting process that varies depending on the needs of each book’s content and genre.
To meet the varied publishing needs of the university community, VTP collaborates with academic units (departments, institutes, centers, etc.) on individual long-form works such as collections of essays, conference volumes, and institutional histories. These books are published by the unit in association with VTP, so they follow the editorial protocols established by each unit.
Books authored and edited by Virginia Tech undergraduate and graduate students are published by the respective department, school, or college in association with VTP. Because these books are usually the culmination of class projects for advanced or capstone courses, students and class instructors establish their own editorial oversight and peer review practices.
All VTP journals are peer reviewed. While each journal determines the particular peer review structure that best meets the needs of that journal, VTP encourages every journal to adhere to the guidelines and best practices set forth by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Student-run journals implement some form of peer review as part of a faculty-mentored authorship experience. Each student journal is responsible for its own peer review policy and mentoring practices. To learn more about the peer review policy of a particular journal, go to that journal’s website.
VTP supports community members who wish to publish scholarly and educational works, like Digital Humanities projects, that employ nontraditional tools and platforms. VTP also publishes innovative works that explore wider connections among the arts and humanities, social sciences, and STEM fields. These projects undergo one or more types of pre-publication review, depending on that particular project’s genre and audience.
VTP collaborates with the University Libraries’ Open Education Initiative (OEI) to publish original and adapted educational resources (OER) that are openly licensed, including textbooks. All proposals are reviewed in-house prior to project acceptance. Projects are accepted based on these criteria:
All open textbooks undergo one or more types of pre-publication review, depending on subject matter and areas of perceived need. These can include:
Single-author works are always subject to commissioned external pre-publication peer review by experts in the field. In-class field studies and commissioned external reviews are conducted by the Open Education Initiative staff in conjunction with Virginia Tech’s Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning and VTP. Authors are also strongly encouraged to implement course materials in class for a minimum of one semester before public release. All review processes are intended to identify aspects of the manuscript needing improvement and are implemented by the author in consultation with the book’s sponsoring editor.
After publication, open textbooks may be selected and openly reviewed to be included in the Open Textbook Library.
VTP creates freely available content that follows the principles of open knowledge and open research. All our publications are released under open licenses, usually Creative Commons licenses.
VTP encourages authors to make research objects associated with their publications openly available whenever possible. This includes research data, software, and methodologies. For members of the VT community, we particularly encourage them to use the Virginia Tech Data Repository.
VTP works with the Library’s Digital Libraries and Repositories team to ensure future accessibility and usability of digital assets. We use local digital preservation systems and geographically distributed digital preservation networks such as MetaArchive and Academic Preservation Trust.