Diamond OA communities-of-practice in action: Wayfinders #6

Wednesday, 5 November 2025 at: 8pm – 9pm Australian Eastern Daylight Time / 9am – 10am GMT / 10am – 11am West African Time and 10am – 11am Central European Time

Other time zones: (Time converter tool)

The term diamond open access means various things to different stakeholders, but at its core sit principles of zero researcher-facing fees and direct ownership/ governance by scholars.

Many feel that not charging fees is the most inclusive form of open access. Many feel that this economically precarious way of publishing is hard – and perhaps even impossible to sustain.

This session will dispel myths and explore the many facets and features of diamond open access via inputs from those actively coordinating communities at the frontline of this approach:

• Femi Arogundade, No-Fee Open Access Publishing in Africa Community of Practice moderator 
• Jane Buggle, Irish Open Access Publishers’ Diamond group co-ordinator
• Tracy Creagh, Australasian Diamond Community of Practice co-convener

Join us live for this sixth session in the #OASPAWayfinder series – taking place on 5th November 2025 at: 8pm Australian Eastern Daylight Time / 9am GMT / 10am West African Time and 10am Central European Time.

As with previous Wayfinders, this will be a practical conversation about ways to broaden participation in open access, moderated by OASPA’S Malavika Legge. We warmly invite your thoughts and questions for the panel during the webinar.

Link to registration page: https://bit.ly/registration-november-2025.  Please share with all whom you think may be interested.

Please note that views expressed in OASPA webinars are those of the individual speakers and do not represent the view of OASPA.

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Panelist Biographies

Femi Arogundade is a microbiologist, public health instructor, and the Open Science Community Manager and consultant for the West and Central African Research and Education Network (WACREN). With extensive experience in open access publishing, research ecosystems, and open research infrastructure, he has a longstanding commitment to advancing equitable access to knowledge as a public good. Femi also serves as the Community Lead/Moderator for the No-Fee Open Access Publishing in Africa Community of Practice, a collaboration between WACREN, Electronic Information for Libraries (EIFL), and African Journals Online (AJOL). He is also the Community Lead for the Coalition for Open Access Publishing of Public Health in Africa (COPPHA). As a consultant, he has worked with several organisations in the United States on developing open educational and open science resources. He has collaborated with key organisations championing equitable access to knowledge, including Knowledge E’s Open Science initiative (the Forum for Open Research in MENA).
LinkedIn: @femi-arogundade-microbiologist

Jane Buggle is the Librarian at the Institute of Art, Design + Technology in Dublin. She is founder/ Manager of the Irish Open Access Publishers (IOAP) community of practice, Chair of the Library Association of Ireland’s Library Publishing Group, and Convenor of the IFLA Library Publishing Special Interest Group (SIG).

Tracy Creagh is part of Queensland University of Technology’s Office for Scholarly Communication in the Library, managing their collection of Diamond open access scholarly journals – and current Managing Editor of the Student Success Journal. Tracy is a member of the ALMASI International Advisory Board and co-convenor of the Australian Scholarly Communications Community of Practice Diamond Journal Publishing group supported by Open Access Australasia and the Council of Australasian University Librarians. Tracy also works with DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) as their Communications Assistant – supporting international engagement via blogs, social media and support for projects, collaborations and event.
LinkedIn @tracy-creagh
Bluesky @creaght.bsky.social

Malavika Legge is OASPA’s Program Manager, leading activities supporting OASPA’s vision for the future of open access. She also authors OASPA’s posts on Equity in Open Access and is creator of OASPA’s Wayfinders. With roots in content development, and extensive experience from a variety of roles in corporate and non-profit scholarly publishing, her work enables cross-functional collaboration and brings disparate groups together. Malavika dreams of a world where scholarly publishing is open – by default, for everyone.