Fund to Mission Year-End Challenge
Use End-of-Year Funds to Support Open Access with University of Michigan Press
In partnership with Lyrasis, we have issued a year-end challenge: Help us reach $600,000 in net income and 250 supporting libraries by June 30, 2025, to fully fund 60 new open-access books through our Fund to Mission initiative (2-minute explainer video here). In return, get unique access to thousands of restricted-access backlist books for your patrons and over 250 proven course-adoptable books.
Thanks to an impressive 96% renewal rate, UMP has already raised $514,638 with 232 libraries participating. Just a few more supporters will help close the gap and ensure the success of this vital initiative - and at the guaranteed cheapest price of $30 per book. The 2025 UMP Ebook Collection includes approximately 80 titles, with 75% published open access immediately thanks to the Fund to Mission model. To date, Fund to Mission has made over 500 titles freely available, with more than 5 million global uses (an average of almost 10,000 uses per title)—a testament to the vast reach and impact of collective library support. All UMP EBC titles are hosted on Fulcrum, a community-developed, open-source platform for digital scholarship. Fulcrum offers the best possible version of UMP titles, featuring:
- Accessibility Statement and a Public Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) Version 2.4 INT
- EPUB 3 reader optimized for mobile devices
- EPUB 3 and PDF downloads
- Unlimited, DRM-free, multiuser access
- Whole ebook ILL and peer-to-peer sharing links
- Text and Data Mining permission
- Select titles enhanced with multimedia
- Zoomable online images
- Embedded audio and video
- OpenURL compliance
- Metrics dashboard including COUNTER 5 and SUSHI
- Authentication via Shibboleth, IP access, and OpenAthens
Sample award-winning open-access titles are available to view on Fulcrum.
Your participation—whether through renewing your support, joining as a new supporter of the 2025 frontlist, or making a one-time investment in backlist titles—will directly advance the right to read and contribute to a more sustainable, open future for humanities and social science publishing.
For more information, including pricing, visit the Lyrasis website. To inquire about participation, please contact: membersupport@lyrasis.org.
