Skip to Main Content

SPARK Digital Commons Repository

SPARK is the Institutional Repository (IR) for Bethel University's digital resources and digital commons for advancing the strategic objective of supporting open access to Bethel's scholarship.

SPARK Policies

These policies apply to all readers and all faculty, students, and staff who use SPARK, Bethel University’s institutional repository. 

What is SPARK:  

Bethel University creates impact by highlighting the products of its scholarly community in the SPARK institutional repository. SPARK’s goals include advancing academic freedom, knowledge, and research by collecting, preserving, and providing access to the scholarly and creative works produced at Bethel and its affiliated community. There are no funding or research-based requirements for a work (“Work”) to be eligible to be published in SPARK. SPARK policies are consistent with copyright law.

The types of Work allowed in SPARK include: 

  • Versions of Work, including unpublished pre-prints, accepted manuscripts, postprints or published versions (“Versions”), or a link to a publisher’s Version online.
  • Student theses/dissertations and student papers.
  • Data sets.
  • Conference proceedings and posters.
  • Faculty development resources.
  • Committee reports and organization newsletters.
  • Community learning.

Policies

  1. The SPARK repository is a permanent record of Works created by the Bethel-affiliated community. Once a Work is deposited, a Version of the Work and its citation will always remain.
  2. The author/creator retains ownership and control of copyright to the Work submitted, subject only to granting the university a non-exclusive license, or the rights to keep a self-archive copy in SPARK, upon submission. Granting a non-exclusive license allows the author/creator to keep their copyrights and/or transfer them in any way they choose.
  3. The Work must be the author/creator’s original Work product. The Work must not not infringe on the intellectual property or other legally protected rights of any third party rights.
  4. The author/creator is responsible for copyright and privacy/confidentiality issues in their submissions. Work submitted must have any redactions, necessary citations, acknowledgments and/or permissions before it is submitted.
  5. If published elsewhere, the Work must comply with that publisher's policies when submitting a Work. It must be marked with which Version is being submitted and if the publisher requires Creative Commons Licensing, it must be marked with an attribution license. 
  6. For Works posted in SPARK that display a Creative Commons license in their record and/or on the Work itself, the use of that Work is governed by the terms of the license selected by the author/creator.  
  7. Embargos are only allowed under certain circumstances up to 2 years, and no permanent embargos are allowed. Situations warranting an embargo include patent pending, personal privacy, corporate secrets, or copyright agreements with potential publishers. 
  8. Bethel may keep more than one copy of a Work, which may be backed up, stored, or migrated to another medium or format, for the purposes of future preservation, access, reproduction, and distribution.  
  9. To submit Work to SPARK, you must create an account in SPARK here with your Bethel email.
  10. Because materials in SPARK are available to anyone with internet access, Bethel shall have no responsibility or liability for any third party use of a Work following submission. 

Author’s Rights

  1. The author/creator retains ownership and control of copyright to the Work submitted.
  2. The author/creator is encouraged to retain their copyrights to be able to contribute their Work or self-archive it in an institutional repository.
  3. Any editing, reproduction, or other use of this material requires the express written permission of the copyright owner. >

For further information about copyright, see: Author Copyright Guidelines

Fair Use 

Fair use (Title 17, §107 U.S.C.) for educational purposes or personal use is allowed. Otherwise, you may not reproduce, republish, post, transmit or distribute any material from SPARK in any physical or digital form without the permission of the copyright owner of the material.

Retention of Works

The repository is a permanent record of Works created by the Bethel-affiliated community. Once a Work is deposited, a citation to the Work will always remain. Bethel may, without changing the content, convert the digital copy to any medium or format necessary for the purpose of long-term preservation. 

Updated Versions of content may be posted, and can be linked to the first posted Version. Earlier Versions may be removed, but we encourage authors to maintain these Versions in the repository as a record of the development of posted contents. 

If contributors leave Bethel, their Work will remain in the repository. At their request, new contact information can be added to their files. 

Withdrawal of Works

Removing content is only allowed in exceptional circumstances. In these cases, authors may request that the SPARK Coordinator remove specific Works. Reasons for removal may include contractual issues, copyright infringement, plagiarism, or falsification of data. 

The SPARK Coordinator is responsible for approving and documenting all such withdrawals, in consultation with the author and/or department affiliates.

QUESTIONS? 

If you have questions about SPARK policies, please contact spark@bethel.edu.

(Adapted with permission from St. Kates, Sophia Repository, https://sophia.stkate.edu/policies.html)

SPARK Policies © 2024 by Kari Jagusch is licensed under CC BY 4.0