Prior to submitting a thesis or dissertation to Vireo, the student should discuss with their thesis or dissertation chair any embargo restrictions on publishing the work to ProQuest.
During submission of an ETD through Vireo, the student will need to agree to a non-exclusive license for ProQuest. This agreement is between the author of the work and ProQuest through its UMI Dissertation Publishing Business (ProQuest/UMI). More information on this can be found on the page Submission of Theses or Dissertations using Vireo.
All students submitting a thesis or dissertation must do so through the Vireo Submission Portal.
After successful submission of Electronic Theses/Dissertations through the Vireo system, ECU will upload all theses and dissertations to ECU's The ScholarShip and to ProQuest’s PQDT directly. Any business that a student wishes to do with PQDT is independent of ECU and the Vireo submission process.
The ScholarShip is ECU’s Institutional Repository and is used under the conditions of enrollment which grants the University a limited ability to reproduce the works done by students. It is the student’s responsibility to request a change or extension for an embargo.
The ProQuest database (linked here) is used because it has a far-reaching audience. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global is the most comprehensive collection of dissertations and theses from around the world. Its coverage spans from the 18th century to the present day and includes full text for graduate works added since 1997, along with selected full text for works written prior to 1997. It contains a significant amount of new international dissertations and theses both in citations and in full text. Students agree to the PQDT license as part of their upload process in Vireo. ECU’s theses and dissertations are sent to ProQuest with the same embargo settings that the student chooses for ECU’s Institutional Repository. It is the student’s responsibility to contact PQDT if they want to change or extend a PQDT embargo (otherwise the thesis or dissertation is viewable by other database subscribers at the conclusion of any embargo).
Upon submission, all theses and dissertations will be included in the ECU Institutional Repository (The ScholarShip) and, in addition, will be delivered to the Proquest database, subject to the publishing agreement and the embargo period selected by the student. Students will select among options offered to them during the vireo submission process, with the mutual agreement of the chair of the committee.
Metadata from the theses or dissertations, including the abstract and keywords, will be published in Masters Abstracts International or Dissertation Abstracts International. Additionally, abstracts and keywords will be immediately available in the PQDT database and in ECU’s Institutional Repository. Metadata will be freely available regardless of an embargo selection.
Selection of an embargo will be according to the selections made by the student and will be set for both the ECU Institutional Repository and PQDT database. The student is responsible for requesting any changes or extensions in embargoes. Such requests for the ECU Institutional Repository must be made to Joyner Library at ALS_ETD@ecu.edu. Requests to change or extend an embargo for a work in the PQDT database must be made directly to PQDT: Author and School Relations Department at 800-521-0600 ext 77020 or email at disspub@proquest.com.
As a condition of enrollment at ECU, each student grants the University a limited, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to reproduce the student’s thesis or dissertation, in whole or in part, in electronic form to be posted on the ECU Institutional Repository and made available according to the publishing option selected by the student and subject to the embargo period selected. In short, when students go to submit their document in Vireo, students may select WHEN.
You will have the following options as to WHEN you want your work to be released for viewing in the Institutional Repository and the ProQuest Database (Select one).
You may choose to have your work available for worldwide access via the internet IMMEDIATELY.
OR
You may choose to have access to the full text of your work and any supplementary material DELAYED for the period of time indicated below. During the delay period, no one may access the fulltext of my work.
6 month embargo
1 year embargo
2 year embargo
A copyright is an intangible right granted to the author or originator of certain literary or artistic productions, under which he or she is invested for a limited period with the sole, exclusive privilege of making copies and publishing and selling them.
Copyright protection automatically exists from the time the work is created in fixed form. The copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the author who created the work unless it is a work-for-hire or unless ownership has been assigned by written agreement.
While registering your copyright is a legal formality, East Carolina University requires that you include a copyright notice following the title page. Typical copyright notices take this form:
Copyright 2015, Jane E. Student
- Or -
© 2015, Jane E. Student
Copyright registration establishes a public record of a thesis or dissertation and copyright. In the U.S., registration is required before one can file an infringement lawsuit. Registration also allows the registered to be awarded damages and attorney fees in an infringement action. Generally, one must have registered before the infringement occurs to have these benefits.
The student may file an application for copyright for $35 with the U.S. Copyright Office, 101 Independence Ave., S.E., Washington, DC 20559-6000. For more information, see the U.S. Copyright Office Website.
Copyright laws are vague, and can be confusing. It is left up to the student to make sure they understand their rights pertaining to their work as well as the rights of those whose work that may be used in the student’s research. Pay careful attention to these laws and their consequence on publishing. ECU’s Copyright Officer is available to answer any questions about copyright or fair use. The Copyright Officer can be reached at copyright@ecu.edu.
For more information about copyright, please visit ECU’s copyright website
Fair Use is an exception to the Copyright Law that allows the work to be used in educational activities such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, research, and scholarship. To determine if the use of previously published materials in a thesis or dissertation falls under fair use, please visit ECU’s copyright website *(linked at the bottom of this page). There is a number of resources as well as templates for requesting permission to use items within a work.
ECU’s Copyright Officer is available to answer any questions about copyright or fair use at copyright@ecu.edu.
When deciding on publishing options for a dissertation or thesis, it is recommended the student:
If the student plans to publish their dissertation or thesis in the future, it may be prudent to investigate various publishers’ policies. Look for “Instructions for Authors” or “Copyright Information” on a specific journal’s website. Questions regarding this matter can be directed to the Scholarly Communication Department at scholarlycomm@ecu.edu.
A researcher or author identifier is a unique number that identifies a specific author. Because of the vast number of authors in the world, it is becoming increasingly important to ensure a work is uniquely and explicitly related to the author who published it. For the author, identifiers are useful to guarantee that their work is always ascribed to them regardless of name, institution, or affiliate changes. For the public, researcher identifiers are practical tools for delineating authors that are similar in name, subject of research, or otherwise. In addition, researcher identifiers are easy to use and free.
There are several types of author identifiers:
ORCID - One of the most versatile author identifiers available (Recommended)
Scopus Author Identifier - Attached to Scopus
ResearcherID - Attached to Thomson Reuters products like Web of Science
arXiv Author IDs - Used with arXiv, an open repository of e-prints in physics, mathematics, computer science, etc
To learn more about researcher identifiers check out the ORCID Libguide linked below. This guide walks through the process of setting up an ORCID and an ORCID profile, in addition to providing more information about all the above listed research identifiers and in general.
Some materials may have a creative commons license as indicated by the symbols "CC", "BY", "SA", "NC", or "ND", usually preceded by "CC" (for example: CC-BY-SA). In general, the license promotes reuse of original material which can be accomplished in many ways. Students who wish to use material under a creative license must review and adhere to the conditions dictated by the license type filed by the creator. The most important condition for using these materials is attribution; see below for links on how to appropriately attribute a material to the licensor/creator. Usually, when accessing and gaining the material, users will see the conditions stipulated by the creator. Below are many links to the creative commons licenses, attribution guidelines, and common questions. Students are encouraged to thoroughly read through the license agreement before using the protected material.
Best practices for attribution
An ideal attribution
Licensing types
Creative Commons FAQ page
The 4.0 license
The 3.0 license
The 2.0 license
Digital copies of theses and dissertations are archived by ECU Libraries and by ProQuest in the PQDT database.