A group of researchers at St Andrews recently published an assessment of their public engagement activities in the open access journal PLoS ONE. One of the authors, Mark Bowler stated:
It's great to have it in a high impact open-access journal so that zoos can access it freely as well as universities.
Not only have they made sure that the results of their research can be accessed by anyone, the authors have promoted their work in a guest blog post for the Wellcome Trust: The Science of Public Engagement. The blog highlights the point that 'while assessment of engagement is increasingly a requirement for some funders, it is still far from the norm'. It also describes the continuing importance to researchers of having their research peer reviewed and published on a recognised platform.
See the article on the University of St Andrews Research portal and of course in our repository Research@StAndrews:FullText
Bowler, M., Buchanan-Smith, H., & Whiten, A. (2012). Assessing Public Engagement with Science in a University Primate Research Centre in a National Zoo PLoS ONE, 7(4) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0034505
(This research was supported by a Wellcome Trust People Award to Prof Andy Whiten.)
Monday, 16 April 2012
Friday, 13 April 2012
Discovery service for open access books
The Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) has just been launched with over 750 academic books available under an Open Access licence.
Books are available in a range of subjects with a particularly strong presence in History and Social Sciences.
DOAB ensures that books are available to readers with as few restrictions as possible, and requires that academic books in the directory are peer reviewed prior to publication.
DOAB is a service of the OAPEN Foundation, and policies have been developed in conjunction with the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA).
Press release:
Books are available in a range of subjects with a particularly strong presence in History and Social Sciences.
DOAB ensures that books are available to readers with as few restrictions as possible, and requires that academic books in the directory are peer reviewed prior to publication.
DOAB is a service of the OAPEN Foundation, and policies have been developed in conjunction with the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA).
Press release:
Tuesday, 10 April 2012
Open access 'revolution' in the news
The Guardian has published 2 articles using the term 'academic spring' to describe revolutionary changes in academic publishing, and Radio 4's Today programme highlights a call to 'share research papers'.
'Academic spring: how an angry maths blog sparked a scientific revolution' is a lengthy and very informative article covering academic publishing, the REF, the rationale for open access, and background to the boycott of Elsevier which now has over 9000 signatories.
The Director of the Wellcome Trust, Sir Mark Walport, also spoke on Radio 4's Today programme about the 'enormously important' developments in academic publishing, and described open access as the best way to maximise impact of research. The new journal eLife, jointly supported by Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Max Planck Society and the Wellcome Trust, will be available later this year.
'Wellcome Trust joins 'academic spring' to open up science' makes front page news, and explains how Wellcome is supporting the transition to open access publishing with a new journal - eLife - as well as with tougher demands on institutions to ensure Wellcome-funded research output is made open access.
The Director of the Wellcome Trust, Sir Mark Walport, also spoke on Radio 4's Today programme about the 'enormously important' developments in academic publishing, and described open access as the best way to maximise impact of research. The new journal eLife, jointly supported by Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Max Planck Society and the Wellcome Trust, will be available later this year.
Friday, 30 March 2012
Wellcome Trust suggests institutional responsibility for open access compliance
Times Higher Education has reported that the Wellcome Trust may require institutions to take more responsibility for ensuring that publications associated with a Wellcome-funded grant are made open access. This may go as far as holding back final installments, or restricting future grants, if research outputs are not openly accessible.
The Wellcome Trust’s grant condition 6(iii) states “All research papers that have been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, and are supported in whole or in part by the Grant, must be made available from UK PubMed Central (UKPMC) as soon as possible, and in any event within six months of publication, in line with the Trust’s Open Access policy: http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/About-us/Policy/Policy-and-position-statements/WTD002766.htm
The tougher message from the Wellcome Trust coincides with a new draft open access policy from RCUK, with stronger requirements including reduced embargo periods. See the announcement from the Enabling Open Scholarship organisation.
Information about complying with the Wellcome Trust policy for St Andrews author is available on our Library web pages
More on research funders' open access policies
The Wellcome Trust’s grant condition 6(iii) states “All research papers that have been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, and are supported in whole or in part by the Grant, must be made available from UK PubMed Central (UKPMC) as soon as possible, and in any event within six months of publication, in line with the Trust’s Open Access policy: http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/About-us/Policy/Policy-and-position-statements/WTD002766.htm
The tougher message from the Wellcome Trust coincides with a new draft open access policy from RCUK, with stronger requirements including reduced embargo periods. See the announcement from the Enabling Open Scholarship organisation.
Information about complying with the Wellcome Trust policy for St Andrews author is available on our Library web pages
More on research funders' open access policies
Thursday, 15 March 2012
New journal hosting service for St Andrews
The University of St Andrews Library has just launched a new service to support academic staff and students at the University wishing to run their own online journal. The journal hosting service uses OJS (Open Journal Systems) to support the publishing process. OJS provides extensive functionality to help with editorial workflows and is an excellent platform for long-term online access to journal content.
The service is run by our Repository team and complements the opportunities for scholarly communication and open access offered by the Research@StAndrews:FullText platform.
Following a pilot phase, we are delighted that 3 journals are now live on our OJS platform.
Ethnographic Encounters is a platform for the work of the University of St Andrews undergraduate Social Anthropology students. The brand new e-journal presents a valuable resource for future students to draw on the experience and insights of their predecessors, and offers a means for Social Anthropology students throughout the world to engage with their peers in St Andrews.
Journal of Terrorism Research, published by the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence began in 2010 and has been relaunched using OJS. The aim of this Journal is to provide a space for academics and counter-terrorism professionals to publish work focused on the study of terrorism.
Theology in Scotland has existed in print since 1994, and for the first time is making back issues available through the journal hosting service. The journal publishes articles and book reviews from authors from across the theological spectrum, and particularly welcomes submissions which focus on aspects of Scottish theology. To date, these have included: studies of the work of prominent Scottish theologians; responses to current issues in the Scottish church and nation; and aspects of Scottish church history.
These journals show the flexibility of the service which allows some or all of the content to be made available open access, supporting existing publications or providing opportunities for new projects.
For more information, see our Library web pages or email journal-hosting@st-andrews.ac.uk
The service is run by our Repository team and complements the opportunities for scholarly communication and open access offered by the Research@StAndrews:FullText platform.
Following a pilot phase, we are delighted that 3 journals are now live on our OJS platform.
Ethnographic Encounters is a platform for the work of the University of St Andrews undergraduate Social Anthropology students. The brand new e-journal presents a valuable resource for future students to draw on the experience and insights of their predecessors, and offers a means for Social Anthropology students throughout the world to engage with their peers in St Andrews.Journal of Terrorism Research, published by the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence began in 2010 and has been relaunched using OJS. The aim of this Journal is to provide a space for academics and counter-terrorism professionals to publish work focused on the study of terrorism.Theology in Scotland has existed in print since 1994, and for the first time is making back issues available through the journal hosting service. The journal publishes articles and book reviews from authors from across the theological spectrum, and particularly welcomes submissions which focus on aspects of Scottish theology. To date, these have included: studies of the work of prominent Scottish theologians; responses to current issues in the Scottish church and nation; and aspects of Scottish church history.These journals show the flexibility of the service which allows some or all of the content to be made available open access, supporting existing publications or providing opportunities for new projects.
For more information, see our Library web pages or email journal-hosting@st-andrews.ac.uk
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