Impact of Lever Press Titles

Lever’s Values and Commitments

When Lever Press was formed, its founders articulated a set of guiding values upon which the press would base its work—values that centered on publishing high quality scholarship aligned with the liberal arts ethos, using an economically sustainable approach, and establishing best practices for born-digital, peer reviewed, open access monograph publishing.

By embodying these values, the press would be “responsive to the needs of readers, authors, and member institutions, share our liberal arts focus broadly, and engage globally with others in the exchange of new scholarship”. [Lever Press “Our Values”]

Nine years in, and about to begin its third membership phase, Lever Press continues to publish open access, born-digital peer reviewed scholarship that benefits authors and scholars, teachers and students, and libraries and their institutions. [Lever Press book catalog]

Quantitative Data

Lever’s titles are hosted on the Fulcrum platform and distributed to a number of book indexers, discovery services, and aggregator platforms including JSTOR Open Access eBooks, MUSE Open, and OAPEN and its Directory of Open Access Books. Publishers can run reports from each vendor to gather data about usage of their titles—how many times a title was viewed, downloaded, and for some vendors, from what country or territory. Gathering data from many separate sources can be a tedious undertaking, but was recently made easier by the introduction of the Book Analytics Dashboard. This dashboard gathers in one place usage data from multiple sources, including downloads from OAPEN and Fulcrum as well as Crossref Event data (which captures online mentions or discussion of a title such as on social media, Wikipedia, blogs, news articles and the like). JSTOR data is not yet included but will be added soon.

From March of 2020 through May of 2024, the Book Analytics Dashboard shows that Lever titles have been accessed more than 55,000 times, downloaded over 48,000 times, had nearly 7,000 online mentions, and reached 172 countries and territories. When we add in the data from Lever title usage in JSTOR Open Access eBooks and MUSE Open, the numbers are even more impressive—Lever’s titles have been accessed globally more than 170,000 times, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe and many locations in between.

Qualitative Data

However, quantitative data is only part of the picture; qualitative data from users is also needed to bring the usage and impact picture into better focus. To help capture this feedback, the Fulcrum platform, which hosts Lever’s titles along with those of many other publishers, allows users to voluntarily provide feedback through use of an unobtrusive Fulcrum Free Ebook Survey pop-up window. Those who don’t wish to respond can simply close the survey window and proceed with their session.

The survey allows users to voluntarily respond to any or all of these questions:

• How did you find out about this book?
• Why are you interested in this book?
• What are you going to do with it now that you have it?
• Is there anything else you would like to tell us or think we should know about how you found or are using the ebook, or about yourself?

There is also an option for respondents to indicate their willingness to be contacted to answer some follow-up questions via email.

What Users Are Saying

A look at the survey feedback illustrates how Lever is being responsive to the needs of scholars, teachers and students, libraries and their institutions, and readers writ large. Below are just some of the comments:

Responsive to needs of scholars

“I am a scholar of Greco-Roman historiography and I'm interested in how historians handle chronology.” (History without Chronology)

“I am a writer and an independent scholar with far-ranging interests, and I love having access to books online.” (Engineering Manhood: Race and the Antebellum Virginia Military Institute)

“I'm involved in digital Humanities and in archival research, and this book is at the intersection.” (Elizabeth Bishop and the Literary Archive)

“I am Assistant Professor of English at a Public sector University in Pakistan pursuing my PhD in English literature. I am really impressed with this free source. Since, in Pakistan we have either no books of this nature or very expensive books.” (Democratic Criticism: Poetics of Incitement and the Muslim Sacred)

“I am a mathematical music theory teacher completing a PhD interested in the work provided here, particularly music history.” (Open Access Musicology, Volume One)

Responsive to needs in the classroom

“It appears to be related to pedagogy which is of interest to me, as are open access resources, especially those that can be used with an undergraduate population.” (Open Access Musicology, Volume One)

“Having online access makes it easier for me to include sections of this anthology in my zero-cost course, since students at my university can access it easily.” (Public Feminisms: From Academy to Community)

“The topic is of interest (disability studies and translation studies work). And I very much want to see all the OA books available. I try to use OA books with my students (as one way to model robust accessibility in my courses).” (What Kind of Island in What Kind of Sea)

“Teach undergraduate music history and want to open up other options to my students for class readings.” (Open Access Musicology, Volume One)

“My 6th graders are researching and teaching about some artists in the Harlem Renaissance, and I wanted to find folks who could connect with my students and share their wisdom and expertise.” (South End Shout: Boston’s Forgotten Music Scene in the Jazz Age)

Responsive to needs of libraries and their institutions

“I'm an academic librarian interested in learning about available OER textbooks that are potential matches for courses at my institution.” (Open Access Musicology, Volume One)

“As a higher ed admin and student services professional, it is essential to incorporate equity and social justice into all of our work AND to have a means of assessment and development.” (Academic Pipeline Programs: Diversifying Pathways from the Bachelor’s to the Professoriate)

“I work in a SLAC and am always excited to read more about ways of framing/understanding/practicing the liberal arts, so I downloaded the book.” (Being a Presence for Students: Teaching as a Lived Defense of Liberal Education)

“Plan to use the book as a resource with bibliographic instruction classes, will be added to a LibGuide as well.” (Transforming the Authority of the Archive: Undergraduate Pedagogy and Critical Digital Archives)

“I am faculty and a dean in the humanities, so I am always looking for ways to help my faculty shift their perspective and better communicate what we do to our campus and the community.” (Extraordinary Partnerships: How the Arts and Humanities are Transforming America)

Responsive to needs of all readers

“I'm looking for ideas and approaches to prompt public discussion of the struggle for economic, social, and environmental justice between under-resourced communities of color in Hawaii.” (An Asian American Theology of Liberation)

“Because, we all need to protect our planet. This is an excellent example of how to empower and educate communities.” (Casa Pueblo: A Puerto Rican Model of Self-Governance)

“I'm so happy this is available to read for free online, and I believe strongly in this kind of access being preserved in an age of privatization, endless subscription costs and paywalls.” (Queer Compassion in 15 Comics)

“It's incredibly helpful to be able to access this book electronically and for free.  I can't always get digital copies of books, which means I cannot read them with text-to-voice software that accommodates my disability.” (Faculty as Global Learners: Off-Campus Study at Liberal Arts Colleges)

“I love the idea of open access—free unrestricted access to education and knowledge makes us all better. The healthier we are, the smarter we are, the more we can collaborate and contribute to society. We can then use that knowledge to create value in the marketplace.” (Meaningful Technologies: How Digital Metaphors Change the Way We Think and Live)

“I am a feminist engaged in community development because I believe in social justice.” (Public Feminisms: From Academy to Community)

“I'm a queer person myself and it means the world to me to have work that represents the community and the wonderful spectrum of people in it. Even if the perspectives might be different from mine. There is nothing more important to humanity than stepping into another person's shoes!” (Queer Compassion in 15 Comics)

“Please keep producing robust OA works! It's been so frustrating to see publishers create works with the label OA that are not actually accessible…We yearn for a reading experience that doesn't tax us for being disabled. THANK YOU for leading the efforts to make an accessible reading experience more possible.” (What Kind of Island in What Kind of Sea)

Conclusion

As detailed above, quantitative usage data for Lever’s titles combined with qualitative, anecdotal feedback from users tells a story of a press that is achieving its goals, staying true to its values, and making an impact.