U. of Iowa Writing Students Quash Planned Open Access.

The article reports on the decision made by the University of Iowa to reverse its plan to make some students' theses freely available online. The University reversed its decision after receiving protests from students in the university's writing programs. The students said the plan could have threatened the potential commercial value of their novels, plays, and other creative works. Lola L. Lopes, interim provost of the university, has announced that Iowa will not publish theses from students in the writing programs as open-access documents. Her decision affects students who will earn master-of-fine-arts degrees in Iowa's wide-ranging graduate writing concentrations in poetry, fiction, nonfiction, playwriting, and translation.