The European University Association (EUA) has recently published a report presenting the findings of the 2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey and providing evidence-based recommendations for institutions, researchers, research funders and policy makers on the transition towards Open Science.
Open Access agreements between consortia/libraries and smaller independent publishers are used worldwide increasingly since 2020, signalling a potential for further growth, highlights an independent report released in June 2021 by Information Power. The report was commissioned by cOAlition S and the Association of Learned & Professional Society Publishers (ALPSP) as a follow up on the outcomes of the Society Publishers Accelerating Open access and Plan S (SPA-OPS) project, published in autumn 2019.
“KEY RESULTS: • Open Science principles: over half (59%) of the surveyed institutions rated Open Science’s strategic importance as very high or high. Open Access to research publications was considered to be highly important for 90% of institutions, but only 60% considered its implementation level to be high. However, the gap between importance and implementation is much wider in data-related areas (RDM, FAIR and data sharing): high importance at between 55-70% of the institutions surveyed, with high levels of implementation at 15-25%. • Open Science policies: 54% of institutions have an Open Science policy and 37% are developing one. Only 9% of surveyed institutions lack an Open Science policy or are not planning to draft one. • Monitoring Open Access to research publications: 80% of institutions monitored the number of publications in their repository and 70% monitored articles published by their researchers in Open Access journals. In addition, almost 60% reported monitoring the cost of publications by their researchers in Open Access journals. • Infrastructure for Open Access to research publications: 90% of the institutions surveyed have their own repository, participate in a shared repository or both. For journal hosting or publishing platforms this figure reaches 66%, and levels out at 57% for monograph hosting/publishing. In addition, 66% of those surveyed reported that their institution has participated in or supported non-commercial Open Access publishing. Data-related skills: over 50% of the surveyed institutions reported that research data skills were only partially available. Moreover, all of the institutions that indicated the absence or partial availability of data skills, considered that more of these skills are needed at institutional level. • Emerging areas of Open Science: Approximately 50% of the respondents know of citizen science and open education activities at their institutions. • Open Science in academic assessment: In 34% of institutions, none of the Open Science elements examined by the survey were included in academic assessments. Amongst the institutions that included Open Science activities in their academic assessments, 77% took into consideration article deposition in a repository. …”
The European University Association (EUA) has recently published a report presenting the findings of the 2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey and providing evidence-based recommendations for institutions, researchers, research funders and policy makers on the transition towards Open Science.
By Agata Morka & Tom Mosterd
In May 2021, together with the Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA), OPERAS hosted a series of three European workshops on business models for open access books targeted specifically at small and medium-sized academic book publishers1. As part of the OPERAS-P project work package 6 (Innovation) OPERAS was looking into innovative, non-BPC business models. The feedback gathered in the course of these three workshops informed a report The Future of scholarly communications, published at the end of June 2021 as an OPERAS-P project deliverable.
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“KEY RESULTS: • Open Science principles: over half (59%) of the surveyed institutions rated Open Science’s strategic importance as very high or high. Open Access to research publications was considered to be highly important for 90% of institutions, but only 60% considered its implementation level to be high. However, the gap between importance and implementation is much wider in data-related areas (RDM, FAIR and data sharing): high importance at between 55-70% of the institutions surveyed, with high levels of implementation at 15-25%. • Open Science policies: 54% of institutions have an Open Science policy and 37% are developing one. Only 9% of surveyed institutions lack an Open Science policy or are not planning to draft one. • Monitoring Open Access to research publications: 80% of institutions monitored the number of publications in their repository and 70% monitored articles published by their researchers in Open Access journals. In addition, almost 60% reported monitoring the cost of publications by their researchers in Open Access journals. • Infrastructure for Open Access to research publications: 90% of the institutions surveyed have their own repository, participate in a shared repository or both. For journal hosting or publishing platforms this figure reaches 66%, and levels out at 57% for monograph hosting/publishing. In addition, 66% of those surveyed reported that their institution has participated in or supported non-commercial Open Access publishing. • Data-related skills: over 50% of the surveyed institutions reported that research data skills were only partially available. Moreover, all of the institutions that indicated the absence or partial availability of data skills, considered that more of these skills are needed at institutional level. • Emerging areas of Open Science: Approximately 50% of the respondents know of citizen science and open education activities at their institutions. • Open Science in academic assessment: In 34% of institutions, none of the Open Science elements examined by the survey were included in academic assessments. Amongst the institutions that included Open Science activities in their academic assessments, 77% took into consideration article deposition in a repository….”
2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey results
by Rita Morais, Bregt Saenen, Federica Garbuglia, Stephane Berghmans and Vinciane Gaillard
This report presents the findings of the 2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey and provides evidence-based recommendations for institutions, researchers, research funders and policy makers on the transition towards Open Science. With more than 270 responses from 36 European countries, the survey report focuses on the level of development of Open Science in European universities. It also addresses the role of Open Science in institutions’ strategic priorities and its implementation in institutional practices.
Professor Erol GelenbeA committee chaired by Prof. Erol Gelenbe MAE at the Royal Academy of Sciences, Letters and Arts of Belgium, which included Prof Veronique Halloin, President of the European Science Foundation, recently published a report “On sharing knowledge and fostering open science” which addresses key problems in scientific and technical communication, and peer review, as we enter the post-Covid-19 period and address the energy transition required by the challenges of Climate Change.
Avanço, Karla, Balula, Ana, B?aszczy?ska, Marta, Buchner, Anna, Caliman, Lorena, Clivaz, Claire, … Wieneke, Lars. (2021, June 29). Future of Scholarly Communication . Forging an inclusive and innovative research infrastructure for scholarly communication in Social Sciences and Humanities. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5017705
This report discusses the scholarly communication issues in Social Sciences and Humanities that are relevant to the future development and functioning of OPERAS. The outcomes collected here can be divided into two groups of innovations regarding 1) the operation of OPERAS, and 2) its activities. The “operational” issues include the ways in which an innovative research infrastructure should be governed (Chapter 1) as well as the business models for open access publications in Social Sciences and Humanities (Chapter 2). The other group of issues is dedicated to strategic areas where OPERAS and its services may play an instrumental role in providing, enabling, or unlocking innovation: FAIR data (Chapter 3), bibliodiversity and multilingualism in scholarly communication (Chapter 4), the future of scholarly writing (Chapter 5), and quality assessment (Chapter 6). Each chapter provides an overview of the main findings and challenges with emphasis on recommendations for OPERAS and other stakeholders like e-infrastructures, publishers, SSH researchers, research performing organisations, policy makers, and funders. Links to data and further publications stemming from work concerning particular tasks are located at the end of each chapter.
OPERAS is the Research Infrastructure supporting open scholarly communication in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) in the European Research Area. Its mission is to coordinate and federate resources in Europe to efficiently address the scholarly communication needs of European researchers in the field of SSH.
The OPERAS Annual Report provides a detailed record of the OPERAS AISBL within 2020: News from the OPERAS Assemblies, activieties and projects within 2020.
Ferguson, L. M., Pampel, H., Bertelmann, R., Dirnagl, U., Zohbi, J. E., Kapitza, D., Keup-Thiel, E., Konrad, U., Lorenz, S., Mittermaier, B., Rechid, D., Schuck-Zöller, S. (2021): Indikatoren fu?r Open Science: Report des Helmholtz Open Science Forum, (Helmholtz Open Science Briefing), Potsdam : Helmholtz Open Science Office, 12 p.
https://doi.org/10.48440/os.helmholtz.024
Abstract (via deepl.com): Open Access, Open Research Data and Open Research Software: These topics are shaping the current discussions on Open Science in the Helmholtz Association. But which indicators can be used to determine the cultural change towards Open Science? And what incentives do indicators provide for the development of Open Access? These and other questions were addressed by the virtual Helmholtz Open Science Forum under the motto “Indicators for Open Science” on January 20, 2021. In the course of the event, indicators for Open Science were presented, examined and discussed with a broad audience from the Helmholtz Association on the basis of impulse and practical presentations. This report summarizes the presentations and discussions of the forum and provides a basis for further developments of the topic area in the community.
Abstract: Open Access, Open Research Data und Open Research Software: Diese Themen prägen die aktuellen Diskussionen zu Open Science in der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Doch an welchen Indikatoren lässt sich der Kulturwandel hin zu Open Science festmachen? Und welche Anreize setzen Indikatoren fu?r die Entwicklung von Open Access? Diesen und weiteren Fragen widmete sich das virtuelle Helmholtz Open Science Forum unter dem Motto „Indikatoren fu?r Open Science“ am 20. Januar 2021. Im Zuge der Veranstaltung wurden anhand von Impuls- und Praxisvorträgen Indikatoren fu?r Open Science vorgestellt, untersucht und mit einem breiten Publikum aus der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft diskutiert. Dieser Report fasst die Vorträge und Diskussionen des Forums zusammen und bietet eine Basis fu?r weitere Entwicklungen des Themenfeldes in der Gemeinschaft.
Cameron Neylon, Magchiel Bijsterbosch, Alastair Dunning, Bianca Kramer, Sarah de Rijcke, Clifford Tatum, & Ludo Waltman. (2021, June 2). An Open Knowledge Base for the Netherlands: Report of a Community Workshop. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4893803
The concept of developing a national Open Knowledge Base for the Netherlands (NL-OKB) has been proposed in response to the strategic needs of the research community in the Netherlands. In parallel with the work of the Dutch Taskforce on Responsible Management of Research Information and Data addressing these opportunities and the preparation of a feasibility study by Dialogic, interested stakeholders were convened with the goal of identifying expert and user-community interests in and need for an NL-OKB.
The goal in convening a workshop was: 1. To gather evidence on the feasibility of an NL-OKB 2. To test the community interest and appetite for developing an NL-OKB 3. To identify a practical pathway forward towards startup and implementation of an NL-OKB
Over two days, 19-20 November 2020, 35 participants representing national and international organisations met in a virtual workshop. This included representatives of VSNU, NWO, NFU, SURF, DANS, CWTS and a range of Netherlands institutions alongside international stakeholders such as Crossref, ORCID, OpenAIRE, DataCite, SPARC North America, Jisc, UKRI and others.
There was strong support for an NL-OKB amongst the assembled group. The group as a whole was strongly in favour of the development of an NL-OKB run on behalf of and controlled by the academic community. Of those present, virtually all indicated they had a direct stake and interest in supporting the development of an NL-OKB. International participants were also keen to see efforts in the Netherlands succeed as an exemplar to be drawn upon. The assembled group reached a series of consensus conclusions, that taken together provide the beginnings of a roadmap for further development.
This report was prepared by the workshop conveners: Cameron Neylon (Curtin University), Magchiel Bijsterbosch (SURF), Alastair Dunning (TU Delft), Bianca Kramer (Utrecht University), Sarah de Rijcke (Leiden University), Clifford Tatum (SURF; Leiden University) and Ludo Waltman (Leiden University). The report may be re-used under a Creative Common Attribution v4 License.
“Together with OPERAS, OASPA is hosting a series of three workshops on business models for open access books targeted specifically at small and medium-sized academic book publishers. These workshops are part of the OPERAS-P project work package 6 (Innovation), looking into innovative, non-bpc, business models to create a sustainable infrastructure for open access book publishing in Europe*. Feedback gathered in the course of these three workshops will inform a report on innovative business models for OA books and will be published by the end of June 2021 as an OPERAS-P project result.
The first of the three events took place on April 7th, for which we invited six publishers from Finland, Croatia, Italy, Germany and the United Kingdom to present their business models for open access book publishing. Each of these publishers shared their experiences and insights with an emphasis on Revenue, Costs, Legal Affairs and Workflows (Production and Distribution). …”
OASPA is pleased to announce the publication of an in-depth report and associated recommendations arising from a study of open access journals across the world that are free for readers and authors, usually referred to as “OA diamond journals”.
Funded by Science Europe and commissioned by cOAlition S in order to gain a better understanding of the OA diamond landscape, the publication of the study is the culmination of work undertaken from June 2020 to February 2021 by a consortium of 10 organisations (including OASPA) led by OPERAS. The study uncovers a vast archipelago of up to 29,000 journals, most of which (60%) are in the humanities and social sciences, serving the needs of multiple scientific communities across the world.
“In 2020 scholars depended on access to digital research more than ever before. The Association saw this as a crucial moment to support controlled digital lending. We worked to increase open access in collaboration with our partners in higher education, and other research library associations, including our work on open science with the International Alliance of Research Library Associations. We stood with others encouraging publishers to open access to research to accelerate the science that ultimately led to COVID-19 vaccines, and beyond that to help our society deal with the public health consequences….”