Copyright Guidance on ETD

An embargo is an action of placing a restriction on public access to your dissertation for a limited, or a specified period. In other words, you are withholding the online visibility and access of the ETD by embargoing.

There can be several reasons to embargo a dissertation, including:

1. If you are planning to submit or already submitted the dissertation content for publication such as a journal article
2. For getting a patent or registered copyright of certain data, content, or intellectual property of the dissertation.
3. If the dissertation includes data covered by a nondisclosure agreement for a specified period.
4. If you are planning to include a previously published work as dissertation chapter and/or the publisher is restricting its reuse.
5. Having a specific agreement with a publisher on a Copyright Transfer Agreement, or any other publisher requirements.

Receive permission to embargo the thesis or dissertation from the director of graduate studies in the student's department, the committee chair, the department chair, or the dean of the pertinent school/college.

As your ETD will be available in KU Sholarworks as well as in ProQuest/UMI database, you will need to

• Fill out the ETD release form and select the required embargo period.
• “Chose the delayed release” during the submission process to ProQuest.

Read more from KU Graduate Studies.

Read more about KU Embargo policy.