It is very common to hear the terms Open Access and Scholarly Communication. Those concepts belong to a greater topic called is Open Science. As part of my graduate studies, I have some understanding of this area (and misconceptions), but while I read more and attend to event like this Seminar, I realize the need to prepare better and learn more. It is really interesting the importance European Universities are giving to Open Science. This is the first time I learn about the 8 pillars, indicators or challenges from Open Science: Citizen Science, Skills and Education, Research Integrity, FAIR Data, European Open Science Cloud, Future of Scholarly Communication, Research Indicators and Next Generation Metrics, and Rewards and Incentives.
As Dr. Paul Ayris mentions, Open Science is the directed path. This is the right future, the right direction of travel. We are not right there yet, but we think this is the right way. Alternative Publishing Platforms are the way to continue is Scholarly Communications. Research data is the new currency in Open Science, in Open Scholarship. I totally agree with these comments, even when there is a lot to continue doing in this area. As young researchers we can take some steps directed to Open Science.
In other hand, Dr Rebeca Lawrence mentions that Open Science/Research aims at increasing research quality, boosting collaboration, speeding the research process making the assessment of research more transparent, promoting the public access to scientific results as well as introducing more people to the academic research. (Frieske & Schilhaver, 2015). She also mentions, the main barriers to uptake the Open Research are primary focus on evaluation, not enough support at ground level, lack of skill set, requires collective action among stakeholders and the lack of infrastructure and funding. She suggests that Open research should be viewed as integrity process not as a product, should focus on goals and move to practical implementations. In my career and research contribution, I would like to be evaluated not only in terms of quantity but in the quality of my work, how much my work is contributed to find new ways/solution to approach a problem.
I believe that one of the biggest challenges in Open Science is to academic organizations and institutions understand the new trends to make science and research accessible to all. Libraries can play an essential role to promote open science to their institutions and faculty, bringing and providing spaces of conversation about these topics. Is in the hands of academic institutions to develop new ways to evaluate the quality of the researches work, not in terms of quantitative metrics, but also in the quality of the work they are doing. Dr. Paul Ayris presented some recommendations libraries can take in promoting Open Science: ensure all academics are aware of Open Access compliance requirements from their funders and looking at Plan S in Geneva.
The University College of London, UCL Press, can be catalogued as one great practice or example in the evolution of Open Science, Open Access and Scholarly Communication. One thing is contributing to the success of UCL Press, is that this initiative is a joint effort, having a network with LERU Consortium. Since 2015 UCL Press has more than 2 million of downloads from 231 countries. LERU Leadership Statement affirms that a culture shift is needed to implement Open Science in Universities, especially in publication and managing costs.
Young researches are limited in terms of what is expected from them in their institutions. Academic institutions still do not support Open Science. We cannot fight with the procedures already established but we can innovate and take leadership promoting Open Science and using these new platforms to promote our research work. We can make accessible to everybody our work and being part of the conversation about Open Science. In terms of open our research and data from publicly funded research, I agree with Dr. Barend Mons opinion, open as possible, closed as necessary; as distributed as possible, as central as necessary.
One interesting topic presented in this seminar that called my attention, was The Research Workflow (Roger C. Schonfeld, The Scholarly Kitchen. I have been working with a similar diagram but this one is more comprehensive to the research process.
Thanks to this seminar, I was introduced to the term Citizen Science in the context of Open Science and the relationship between scientists and people. Citizen Science requires considerations according to discipline, culture, type of activity and level of engagement. Evaluation will not apply in just one form. Citizen Science is still growing in a lot of disciplines. I have never thought in using citizen science, but after this seminar I would consider ways to apply it in my area of research. One of the more important things discussed in this seminar is that Open Science needs to develop more interdisciplinary engagement and projects.
Another topic important from this conference is the dichotomy of Open Science and Excellence. We need quality of work and how to assess it. As one of the panelists mentions, bibliometric is not an indicative of quality, is an indicator of attention. Excellence in research means integrity. Nothing truer as the words of Dr. Eva Méndez, “Openness is a real invitation to quality, if you want to be excellent show it by been open”. In the final conclusions, Silvia Gomez expresses “we have alternatives of publications, we have information to modify indicators we have an understanding we need to change how we are funding and giving rewards. Everybody needs to take little action toward Open Science. We all need to change, Change requires effort, and Effort requires responsibility”. Institutions plays a big role to accept Open Science, but with little actions, we all are responsible to change the current system.
This seminar gave me the opportunity to learn more about Open Access and reflect on ways I can take to support this new trend of doing science. It requires effort, but is our responsibility to promote equality and access to new knowledge and information in a global society. I am really considering to find ways to publish in open access.
#IamAnOpenScientistBecause now I am committed more than ever to quality research, to excellence, to be open, to learn more and advocate about Open Science. hashtag#OS19MADhashtag#OpenScience
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