What Do Editors Want?: Assessing a Growing Library Publishing Program and Finding Creative Solutions to Unmet Needs

The University of Rhode Island (URI) University Libraries publishes five activeopen access, peer-reviewed scholarly journals on our DigitalCommons@URI platform. Ourjournal publishing program has grown slowly but steadily over the last decade, with newservices added incrementally as needed. In early 2019, we conducted three focus groupinterviews with nine editors and assistants representing all of the journals on ourplatform in order to assess our journal publishing efforts. We asked editors to identifythe successes, challenges, and unmet needs that they have encountered in the publishingprocess and what resources they have found to support their journals outside of libraryofferings. We highlight what we learned from our editors: what they value, what theyneed, and what they want from library publishing services. We also outline our plansgoing forward to facilitate ongoing conversations among editors and to find creativesolutions to help them with their biggest challenges.