The benefits and challenges of open access: lessons from practice

Making the most of digital resources 3

What we do?

We deliver services that support the procurement, management and discovery and use of content for UK research and education

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Digital content

Making content available to support teaching and research

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» Providing wide coverage of content for research and teaching by collecting, licensing and preserving high quality digital content

» Procuring excellent deals for institutions for access to third party resources for research and education

» Working with partners to create and delivering high quality content for different needs

Resource discovery

Enabling researchers and students to discover the rich resources held across libraries and archives in the UK

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» Supporting interdisciplinary research and opening up new paths of inquiry

» Helping institutions expose their collections to researchers across the UK and internationally

» Enabling library staff to provide enhanced researcher support » Building community trust and confidence through our close working

collaboration with libraries and archives

Library Support and Analytics Services

Helping libraries more efficiently manage

their collections

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» Helping universities save time and money – saving the sector £70m each year – through licence negotiation

» Providing strategic business intelligence tools, helping institutions to improve decision-making capacity

» Helping the UK academic sector demonstrate international leadership through standards development and implementation

» Removing work entirely from the local institution by doing it at a level above the institution

Open Access Support

Enabling UK higher education to realise the rewards of open access

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jisc.ac.uk/content/open-access

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Engagement challenges

» Discoverability» Delivery barriers» Changing technologies» Digital behaviours» Digital capabilities» “Digital resources” can mean many different things

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Meeting the challenge

» Understanding digital students, learners and staff» Reducing technology barriers» Addressing digital literacy and capability» Effective use of data» Accessibility and inclusion» Communication» Building trust relationships» Collaboration

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Making the most of our support

Account managers and subject specialists are working with our DR services to ensure members are able to make the most of digital resources and library services

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jisc.ac.uk

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Helen BlanchettSubject specialist (scholarly communications)helen.blanchett@jisc.ac.uk

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Making sense of open access

Benefits and challenges of Open access: lessons from practice

University of Portsmouth

• Historically teaching and undergraduate focused• 22,000 students, 1500 staff• Some areas of high research activity top rated in REF – Allied

Health and Physics• 400 research-active staff• Growing research focus

Journals – a growing issue

• At Portsmouth we spend ~£2m pa on journal subscriptions, 40% of library budget

• The average annual rise in journal prices paid by Portsmouth has been 7% over the last 4 years

• The move to electronic journals has introduced greater quantities of journals, VAT payments, ‘big deals’, renting rather than purchasing content

What Jisc means to libraries

• Savings! Collaboration! Deals! Organisation!• Recently Jisc have been trying to quantify the savings• We spend ~£1m pa on deals negotiated by Jisc• Savings from list price of ~£1m• Savings of staff time and benefits of collective bargaining

Open access mandates

HEFCE’s REF eligibility policy“This requirement will apply to journal articles and conference proceedings accepted for publication after 1 April 2016”

RCUK’s OA policy“The policy applies to peer reviewed research articles (including review ‐articles not commissioned by publishers), which acknowledge Research Council funding, that are submitted for publication from 1st April 2013, and which are published in journals or conference proceedings.”

University of Portsmouth policy“Journal articles and conference proceedings accepted for publication after 1st January 2014.”

The Portsmouth position

• Repository already in place run by library• Research office implementing CRIS (Pure)• Worked with them on this, OA policy and creation of an OA

post in 2013• Co-location of post: full time library employee, spending two

days a week based in research office

APCs

• RCUK block grant + small fund from University• Application and approval process needed• Green route preferred in university policy• But need to manage expectations• Many understand gold = open access

Unknowns

• What was everyone else doing?• What did researchers think and know?• How could we make it as easy as possible?

• Being involved in Jisc Pathfinder helped with this…openaccess.jiscinvolve.org/wp/

Jisc Pathfinder: Making SenseOxford Brookes, Nottingham Trent, Portsmouth:

sensemakingopenaccess.blogspot.co.uk

Interviews

• Semi-structured, informal conversations• Research leads – 11 across all faculties

interviewed by our Research Outputs Manager

• Extended to some academics interviewed by their subject librarians

• Though sample was small, we learned a great deal through having the opportunity for open conversations

Findings• Broadly aware of OA and accepted its importance for

the REF, RCUK etc. but not aware of the details and their implications

• Common misunderstandings -– Didn’t consider OA in publication strategy before submitting– Difference between OA and hybrid journals– Difference between the ‘3 month rule’ and embargoes– Assumed you can always take the green route to comply– Not aware of the high cost of APCs– Don’t know what REF panel they will be submitting to

• Just want to know what they have to do to comply

Actions

• Some common issues were quickly apparent and actions were taken to address these

• The interviews also helped inform our ongoing activities with awareness raising

• Some examples…

OA awareness plan• It was clear no

single approach to awareness was going to work

• Ensured we had a plan with a variety of methods

• Promotion, training, systems…

Training: OA sessions

People were happy to attend university wide presentations if at a time they could do

• OA sessions increased to every 6 weeks at various times

• Smaller groups

• Part of general Researcher Development Programme

Questionnaires

• Pre and post questionnaires used to improve sessions• Also used with subject librarians eg to improve support

information

Flow chart v.1…

… and simplified further

Research Newsletter

• Regular library section

System• They found current mix of systems confusing

• Reinforced our move to a single portal

Research Portal

• Better engagement with researchers• Sits alongside other profiles• Backed up by PVC(R)• Repository withdrawal

The interviews also led to some tailored support…

• We analysed samples (approximately 50) of our Business School and Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation journals.

• Results demonstrated most but not all journals comply with HEFCE or RCUK via the green route, so there is a need to check before submitting.

• This helped reinforce the message that they do need to consider where to publish at an early stage, whilst keeping the limitations in perspective

We were able to identify staff who already added items to ArXiv and set-up an import to Pure

We were able to set up reports and dashboards in Pure for research leads

Scopus checks

Partners’ outcomes

Oxford Brookes came up with assessment tools to test your personal and institutional readiness for OA

Nottingham Trent conducted interviews with staff and produced a video of a senior academic advocating open access

sensemakingopenaccess.blogspot.co.uk

Individual help

• The vast majority of people do want to be able to contact someone for advice

• We have promoted email help• We do not validate recent articles without a post-

print and so deal with queries at published stage• Now starting to get more questions at an earlier

stage asking about which journals comply• All takes time though!

Expanding the team

• Growing workload• Dedicated team• Moving validation work from Metadata• Research Outputs Officer and Assistant• Data post next?

Data

• Project Board set up to looks at issues• Information Services and PVC(R) involved• Able to make use of CRIS• Questions and issues of support• Data post?

Findings and our ongoing approach

• Practical and focused on the researcher• We have to do stuff for them if we want it to be done• Don’t need buy in just need cooperation• They are happy to take instruction if what they need to do is

made as straightforward as possible

Andrew Simpsonandrew.simpson@port.ac.uk

www.port.ac.uk/library/help/research/open/

Making Sense:sensemakingopenaccess.blogspot.co.ukJisc Pathfinders:openaccess.jiscinvolve.org/wp/pathfinder-projects/