From 26 to 30 June, the city of Philadelphia hosted one of the largest gatherings in the global library calendar: the 2025 American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference. As advocates for open access and champions of equitable knowledge sharing, Frontiers joined thousands of professionals committed to the future of libraries, learning, and open science (OS).

We came to ALA to listen, to understand the evolving needs of library communities, to discuss open access publishing priorities, and to strengthen partnerships with institutions across the United States. Here are some of the insights and takeaways we’re bringing back, and how they shape our ongoing work.

Navigating the realities of open access agreements

Discussions revealed a recurring concern among librarians: the operational and structural complexity of many current open access agreements. Chief among these concerns is the issue of partial access under transformative agreements (TAs), which often preserve paywalled content across portions of a publisher’s portfolio. This fragmentation poses challenges not only for end users, but also for institutions wanting to make concrete progress toward fully open academic publishing.

Equally pressing is the administrative burden that these models place on library staff. This diverts attention from strategic initiatives and creates friction within both library operations and the researcher's experience. Allied to this is the limited range of models considered in national-level negotiations, where preference is frequently given to large, hybrid publishers. This can constrain opportunities to engage with fully open access providers offering more streamlined, transparent alternatives. As a result, there is growing interest in inclusive models, such as Frontiers’ flat fee, that reduce administrative complexity and align more closely with institutional values around openness, equity, and long-term financial sustainability.

The way forward is with consortia management

Sessions and informal conversations at this year’s ALA also highlighted the increasingly complex landscape in which library consortia operate. With constrained budgets and limited administrative capacity, consortia are under growing pressure to demonstrate value. Their role in supporting open access transitions, negotiating licenses, and coordinating services remains essential, yet expectations continue to rise as staffing resources remain flat or decline.

To meet these demands, several attendees called for practical tools that can inform annual reviews, guide strategic planning, and support communication with institutional leadership. There was also strong interest in partnership models that reduce administrative overhead while offering adaptability to diverse institutional contexts. In this evolving environment, consortia are not just managing access, they are shaping the infrastructure of open scholarship, and they need partners that can help them lead with clarity, efficiency, and accountability.

As Frontiers’ US sales representative, James Cho noted:

This is a great opportunity for publishing vendors such as Frontiers to listen and find ways to meet consortia where they are. As a fully open access publisher that values transparency, we can create opportunities that benefit all stakeholders by doing things such as providing the data to demonstrate the value of consortia deals, and simplifying or removing administrative tasks.

Artificial intelligence in academic libraries

Artificial intelligence (AI) featured prominently in several academic-focused sessions, reflecting its growing relevance across academic communication. While there was clear enthusiasm for AI’s potential to support discovery, metadata enrichment, and research analytics, librarians and researchers alike voiced concerns about the lack of shared standards for evaluating these tools. As many noted, AI is already being integrated into library and publishing workflows, yet frameworks for ensuring transparency, accountability, and ethical implementation remain underdeveloped. This presents a dual challenge for institutions: leveraging innovation while safeguarding values such as privacy, inclusivity, and academic integrity.

As such, trusted partners must not only disclose how AI tools are developed and deployed but also ensure that underlying data practices adhere to clear ethical principles. As AI becomes further embedded in the research lifecycle, it will be crucial to build governance frameworks that balance technological potential with the academic community’s expectations for transparency, rigor, and long-term trust.

Let's continue the conversation

If you're an institutional representative (librarian, manager, administrator, director or provost) interested in new OA models or re-evaluating current agreements, we'd like to hear from you.

Contact our institutional partnerships team at institutions@frontiersin.org for more information. Together, we can build a more open and evidence-informed future for academic publishing.

About Frontiers 

Frontiers is one of the world’s largest and most impactful research publishers, dedicated to making peer-reviewed, quality-certified science openly accessible. With more than 3 million researchers across 222 community-led journals covering 1,700 academic disciplines, we provide researchers with a trusted, cutting-edge, AI-powered open science platform to rigorously review their findings and maximize the dissemination of their discoveries.​ As an open access pioneer, we actively drive the global transition to open science, working with researchers, universities, educators, policymakers, and businesses.