CommonKnowledge About
About CommonKnowledge
What is CommonKnowledge?
CommonKnowledge is the online digital repository for the collected scholarship and creative works of Pacific University faculty, staff and students—and of their collaborators from around the world. The creation and maintenance of collections in CommonKnowledge are guided by these values:
- Increasing the impact of local knowledge. The intellectual inquiry and creative expression of Pacific’s faculty, staff, and students often result in work that has the potential to benefit people outside of the University.
- Promoting discovery, innovation, and interdisciplinary work. CommonKnowledge provides a way for members of the Pacific community to not only share with those within their disciplines but to also allow their work to be discovered and used in new and unanticipated ways.
- Preserving the availability of local knowledge. CommonKnowledge provides a persistent, long-term home for work created at Pacific University. By contributing their work to CommonKnowledge, students, faculty, and staff can be assured that their documents and files will be preserved and will be persistently available.
What is in CommonKnowledge?
- Scholarly and creative work created by Pacific University faculty, staff, and students—such as formal publications, research posters, conference papers, academic papers, technical reports, data or databases, artistic and literary creations, and computer code (software, applications, etc)
- Scholarly and creative work created by individuals outside of the Pacific University community
Who can submit content?
All current Pacific University students, faculty*, and staff are eligible to contribute to CommonKnowledge during their course of study or employment at the University. Faculty and staff may contribute content created prior to their employment at Pacific University.
Pacific University alumni are also eligible to contribute; preference will be given for work creating during their course of study at the University.
*Adjunct faculty members must have a minimum of (1) academic year total service to the University to be eligible.
Why should I contribute to CommonKnowledge?
- CommonKnowledge provides a way for the work of those at Pacific to be discovered and used by others outside of our community
- Submissions to CommonKnowledge will be preserved and available in perpetuity, which is helpful when placing links to your work on CVs, resumes, websites, etc.
What can I submit to CommonKnowledge?
Faculty:
- Published articles
- Unpublished manuscripts/documents
- Research posters
- Presentation slides
- Images
- Video
- Audio
- Any form of scholarly or creative work you wish to be made available
Currently, CommonKnowledge has articles, monographs, book chapters, theses, dissertations, critically appraised papers, research posters, conference presentation slides, original research reports, photographs, capstone projects, essays, videos and archival transcriptions.
Students:
- Students should work with faculty to submit their work for inclusion in CommonKnowledge
Currently, CommonKnowledge has articles, eBooks, capstones, theses, and dissertations by students at Pacific.
Are there any types of files I can’t Submit?
CommonKnowledge is open to scholarly and creative work in any digital format. Any type of file can be made available for download, including, but not limited to: documents, audio files, video files, image files, data sets, presentation slides, and computer code. More information is available in the Collection Parameters Policy.
Is CommonKnowledge Open Access?
CommonKnowledge is an open access digital repository. By default, all content will be visible to public users. Except in certain circumstances, both the metadata record for an individual item and the full-text (i.e. complete digital content) will be accessible to all users. More information is available in the Access Restrictions Policy.
How do I know if I am allowed to post my articles in CommonKnowledge?
Published articles and other materials under copyright may require permissions from the copyright holder(s) before posting, depending on the terms of your publisher's copyright transfer agreement. There are two ways to determine what articles (or what versions) you may submit:
- Read the copyright transfer agreement you signed when submitting your article.
- See if your journal/publisher's policy is listed on the SHERPA/RoMEO site.
If permissions are necessary, you do NOT need to secure these permissions prior to submitting work to CommonKnowledge. The repository manager will evaluate your submission and coordinate any necessary permission requests with you, along with letting you know if any further information/material is needed from you before making your work publicly accessible.
How do people outside of Pacific find work that is in CommonKnowledge?
CommonKnowledge is crawled by Google, so anyone searching Google is able to find content related to their search terms in CommonKnowledge. This means that people outside of Pacific don’t have to know that CommonKnowledge exists to discover the work within it!