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Publication Pandemonium: An Asynchronous Online Quiz Competition
for Open Access Week

Devon Olson, MLIS, AHIPa, Sara B. Westall, MLIS, MSb

aResearch and Education Librarian, Library Resources, University of North Dakota School of
Medicine and Health Sciences, Grand Forks, North Dakota,
https://www.orcid.org/0000-0002-1682-0199 , devon.olson.2@und.edu

bNE/SE Clinical Campus Librarian, University of North Dakota School of Medicine and
Health Sciences, Library Resources, Fargo, North Dakota,
https://www.orcid.org/0009-0001-1356-5823 , sara.westall@und.edu

Cite as: Olson D & Westall SB. Publication Pandemonium: An Asynchronous Online Quiz
Competition for Open Access Week. Hypothesis. 2025;37(2). doi:10.18060/29028

Olson, Westall. All works in Hypothesis are licensed under a CC BY-NC
4.0 DEED Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International. Authors own copyright of their
articles appearing in Hypothesis. Readers may copy articles without permission of the
copyright owner(s), as long as the author(s) are acknowledged in the copy, and the copy is
used for educational, not-for-profit purposes. For any other use of articles, please contact the
copyright owner(s).

1

https://www.orcid.org/0000-0002-1682-0199
https://orcid.org/
mailto:devon.olson.2@und.edu
https://www.orcid.org/0009-0001-1356-5823
https://orcid.org/
mailto:sara.westall@und.edu
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/


Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

Abstract
Open Access Week is an international event focused on issues of equity within the scholarly
publishing system. At the University of North Dakota library, we see a diverse range of
attitudes towards OA. To build OA support and combat misinformation, we designed an OA
week quiz competition, “Publication Pandemonium”, with an asynchronous format designed
to include our clinical sites. This event was an overwhelming success despite a short
turnaround, with impressive turnout never before seen in our library programming.

Introduction
Open Access Week is an international event focused on issues of equity within the scholarly
publishing system1-4. At the University of North Dakota library, we see a diverse range of
attitudes towards open access (OA). To build OA support and combat misinformation, we
designed an OA Week quiz competition called “Publication Pandemonium” in an
asynchronous format designed to include our clinical sites. This event was an overwhelming
success despite being quickly launched, with impressive turnout never before seen in our
library programming.

Experience
Our multiple choice, 14 question, online quiz was built using Springshare’s LibWizard survey
tool. Questions in the quiz were designed to vary widely in difficulty, ranging in scope from
basic OA terminology, including data management, to current events knowledge5-10. The quiz
was open to faculty, staff and students all OA Week.

We also created a companion LibGuide and OA Week zine, covering all concepts and
definitions required to correctly complete the quiz5-13 (see Appendix 1). All companion
resources were linked together. For example, QR codes on the zine linked to the quiz and
LibGuide.

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Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

Figure 1. Cover of the OA Week zine, featuring concepts covered in the quiz

Note: for full OA Week Publication Pandemonium zine pdf, see University of South Dakota
Scholarly Commons repository

We partnered with our Associate Dean of Research and Senior Associate Dean of Education,
Medical, and Faculty Affairs to strategize content, outreach, and funding for prizes, as well as
our graphic design department to create visual marketing materials. Announcements were
sent via school emails lists and newsletter, and on digital signage in the weeks preceding,
during, and after the quiz was launched. Advertising for the quiz contained contextual
information about OA, graphics of prizes, timeline information, and hyperlinked or QR codes
to the quiz. Our advertising strategy was designed to reach all of our user groups.

Discussion
Our quiz had an overwhelming and diverse response rate of 54.

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https://commons.und.edu/smhs-lp/11/


Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

Table 1: Quiz participant demographics

Academic Program
or
Department/Office

Average
score

Total
participants

# of
passing
scores
(<70%)

Program
enrollment
spring
2025

% of
enrolled
students
participating
with passing
scores

Center for Rural Health 78.57% 1 1 n/a n/a
Medicine 75.65% 22 18 276 7%
Indigenous Health 69.05% 3 2 54 4%
Occupational
Therapy 66.43% 10 6 206 3%

Medical
Laboratory Science 60.71% 2 1 269 0%

Physical Therapy 57.14% 8 4 318 1%
Alumni Affairs Office 50% 1 0 n/a n/a
Biomedical Sciences 49.29% 3 2 37 5.41%
Public Health 45.24% 3 0 51 0%
Education Resources
Office 42.86% 1 0 n/a n/a

Note: Academic Programs are in bold font, while Departments and Offices are not in bold
font.

Table 2: Quiz-related resource usage

Metric

Count:
month
of August
2024

Count:
month
of September
2024

Count:
month
of October
2024

Count:
month
of November
2024

Count:
month
of December
2024

LibGuides
Views

*the quiz
was linked
on this page

20 13 325 39 47

Zine
Downloads

*posted to
the
institutional
repository in
October

0 0 12 6 6

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Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

Multiple methods were used to determine winners and increase participation and fairness of
the quiz. We had a high score bracket as well as a participation bracket, which awarded prizes
to the program with the highest percentage of enrolled student participants.

Figure 2: Quiz winners’ brackets

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Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

Table 3: Correct and incorrect quiz response rate by question, most to least correct

Question Incorrect
(%)

Correct
(%)

11 What are the four FAIR data management principles? 7.4 92.6
12 University of South Dakota Scholarly Commons is a: 11.1 88.9

3
Is "Creating and Implementing an Indigenous
Evaluation Framework" an open access article? 13.0 87.0

4
Is the Journal of Maternal Health, Neonatology
and Perinatology an open access journal? 13.0 87.0

13 "Double-dipping" in the publishing world refers to: 18.5 81.5
14 Which of the following describes “platinum journals”? 24.1 76.0

2
Which of the following is not a real Creative Commons
license? 27.8 72.2

7
Which journal publishers are currently implicated in a
federal antitrust lawsuit? 27.8 72.2

10 Which of the following is true about the Nelson memo? 35.2 64.8

8
How much revenue in U.S. dollars did Elsevier make
in 2023? 46.3 53.7

9
Which company had a higher profit margin in 2023 than
Elsevier? 48.1 51.9

5 Which of the following is an open access database? 63.0 37.0

6
Which of the following is a real collection of works on
University of South Dakota Scholarly Commons? 63.0 37.0

1
Which of the following is NOT an aspect of open access
publication? 66.7 33.3

Note: For full questions and answers with rates of correct and incorrect answers, see
Appendix 1.

Takeaways
The design of our event and quiz did not allow us to track whether responses were guesswork
or the result of investigation and learning. However, the response data suggests a lack of OA
conceptual knowledge and navigation skills. We will continue our response data analysis to
help strategize instruction and outreach, and are planning follow-up workshops.

It is possible email issues restricted our engagement. Email lists initially excluded
non-medical students and medical program residents have multiple emails to manage, which
may explain their lack of participation despite a publication funding prize.

We received little anecdotal feedback and are wary of drawing too many causal conclusions
from a single event. However, in future, we hope to do more targeted messaging and data
collection throughout, using focus groups to test question difficulty and relevance.

We look forward to making this an annual event, increasing awareness and participation,
creating additional tie-ins with programming such as workshops, and fun companion artefacts
like zines and stickers.

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Peer Reviewed Article Hypothesis, Vol. 37, No. 2, 2025

CRediT Statement
Devon Olson: Conceptualization, Methodology, Validation, Resources, Data Curation,
Writing – Original Draft, Writing – Review & Editing, Visualization, Project Administration

Sara Westall: Conceptualization, Methodology, Resources, Writing – Original Draft, Writing
– Review & Editing, Visualization, Funding Acquisition

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