The Provost’s Task Force on Open Access and Scholarly Communication was established in the summer of 2019 to promote dialogue about open access (OA) and scholarly communication and to explore how the community might best advance one of the University’s core missions: the dissemination of knowledge for the benefit of society. The task force was given a specific mandate to: · gather information and review the broader context; · review relevant policies and practices at Western and other institutions; · consult broadly with the campus community to inform the work of the task force; · provide recommendations, for consideration by Senate, on the development of a Western University commitment to the advancement of open access and sustainable scholarly publishing.