New to the SCN: Publishing Values-based Scholarly Communication | OER + ScholComm

This is the latest post in a series announcing resources created for the Scholarly Communication Notebook, or SCN. The SCN is a hub of open teaching and learning content on scholcomm topics that is both a complement to an open book-level introduction to scholarly communication librarianship and a disciplinary and course community for inclusively sharing models and practices. IMLS funded the SCN in 2019, permitting us to pay creators for their labor while building a solid initial collection. These works are the result of one of three calls for proposals (our first CFP was issued in fall 2020; the second in late spring ‘21, and the third in late fall 2021).

 

Living Our Values and Principles: Annotated Bibliography | Educopia Institute

Community-based values and principles sit at the core of the Next Generation Library Publishing (NGLP) project, and members of our team have done extensive work over the past year researching and synthesizing the values and principles identified by individuals, organizations, and coalitions throughout the open knowledge community. In the course of developing the project and creating resources such as the draft Values and Principles Framework & Assessment Checklist and Living Our Values and Principles: Exploring Assessment Strategies for the Scholarly Communication Field, we found and reviewed dozens of values and principles statements, manifestos, articles, and book chapters spanning the worlds of scholarly communications, open data, open science, and open source software. 

In addition to informing our work on the project, we think the annotated bibliography that we’ve built along the way might be of use to others on similar journeys. To enable others to dig deeply into the articles and values statements contained within this annotated bibliography now and in the future, we are releasing it now as a formal publication. We will continue to add to this resource through the end of the NGLP project in August, 2022. If you find an article or values statement that you think would benefit this project, please reach out to Brandon Locke (brandon@educopia.org) to suggest its inclusion.

The intersections between DORA, open scholarship, and equity | DORA

The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), published in May 2013, does not mention the term ‘open scholarship.’ And yet DORA and open scholarship are becoming increasingly entwined[1]. DORA’s ambition is to improve research evaluation practices but the practicalities of implementation make it impossible to separate the evaluation of research from questions about who and what research is for, who gets to be involved, and how it should best be carried out, all of which have to take account of the power dynamics that shape the scholarly landscape. Equally, progress towards open scholarship, which aims to make the products and processes of academic work as accessible to as many stakeholders as possible, requires changes in the ways that researchers and their research outputs and practices are assessed, incentivized and constructed. Here we examine the growing interactions between DORA and the open scholarship movement. By clarifying the alignment of the values and principles that underpin both endeavors, we see that they raise vital questions about equity and inclusion in research that must be central to reform within research organizations and the wider scholarly community.

Theme of 2019 International Open Access Week To Be “Open for Whom? Equity in Open Knowledge” – Open Access Week

The 2019 Open Access Week Advisory Committee is pleased to announce that the theme for the 2019 International Open Access Week, to be held October 21-27, will be “Open for Whom? Equity in Open Knowledge”.

As the transition to a system for sharing knowledge that is open by default accelerates, the question “open for whom?” is essential—both to consider and to act upon. Whose interests are being prioritized in the actions we take and in the platforms that we support? Whose voices are excluded? Are underrepresented groups included as full partners from the beginning? Are we supporting not only open access but also equitable participation in research communication? These questions will determine the extent to which emerging open systems for research will address inequities in the current system or replicate and reinforce them.

This year’s theme will build on the groundwork laid last year when discussions focused on “Designing Equitable Foundations for Open Knowledge.” The 2018 theme highlighted the importance of making a central commitment to equity as we transition toward new systems for sharing knowledge, and the past twelve months have only seen the pace of that transition increase. Because of this, the Open Access Week Advisory Committee decided it was important to focus on equity again in 2019—to deepen our conversations about being inclusive by design and to turn those conversations into action.

 

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