Focus on Open Science

Chapter XIX: Gdansk

Dr. Paul Ayris, University College London, UK

Dr Ayris is Pro-Vice-Provost (UCL Library Services). He joined UCL in 1997. 

Dr Ayris was the President of LIBER (Association of European Research Libraries) 2010-14. He is Co-Chair of the LERU (League of European Research Universities) INFO Community. He chairs the OAI Organizing Committee for the Cern-Unige Workshops on Innovations in Scholarly Communication. He is also Chair of JISC Collections’ Content Strategy Group. On 1 August 2013, Dr Ayris became Chief Executive of UCL Press. He is a member of the Provost and President’s Senior Management Team in UCL.

He has a Ph.D. in Ecclesiastical History and publishes on English Reformation Studies. In 2019, he was made a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Presentation:

Leading the change to Open Science in European Universities 

This paper will take the LERU Roadmap for Open Science as a blueprint for introducing Open Science principles and practices into universities. UCL (University College London) is in the top 10 of global research-led universities. It is also the third oldest university in England. Using UCL as a case study, this paper will look at the 8 pillars of Open Science, as defined by the European Commission, and examine progress in introducing Open Science principles and practice at a university level. The paper will identify the benefits and challenges of the approach, and highlight what remains to be done.

The paper will end by examining the LERU statement on the Leadership needed for Open Science to succeed.

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen, National Library of Finland

Director, Library Network Services, National Library of Finland 2000–

Adviser of LIBER (2018–2020), President 2014–2018, vice-president 2010–2014

Member of DORA (The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment) advisory committee 2018–2021

Member of the Open Science Policy Platform, European Commission 2016–2018, 2018–2020 

Member of the Digital Heritage Expert Group, 2017–2021, European Commission 2017-2021

Member of the Finnish Open Science strategy group 2017–

Member of the steering committee of the Research information hub - a new window into Finnish research 2017–2020

Member of the steering committee of the Finnish Open Science and Research Initiative 2014–2017

Member of the National Digital Library steering committee 2010–2017

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen is the director of Library Network Services at the National Library of Finland (NLF). She is a director who leads the development of national infrastructure services for HE institutions, public libraries, archives, museums, and other public sector institutions.

The Library Network Services provides national infrastructure services for libraries (universities’ and universities of applied sciences’ libraries, special libraries as well as public libraries), archives, museums and for the public sector as a whole. The services can be divided into two main categories:1) services that improve access to information and 2) metadata and bibliographic services. The services that improve access to information are: national licensing (FinELib), national institutional repository services and national discovery and PaaS service, Finna (finna.fi). Metadata services include development of metadata standards and guidelines as well as national ontologies (finto.fi), development and streamlining of metadata production in collaboration with HE institutions and libraries as well as commercial organisations. The National Ontology Service Finto (finto.fi) is an infrastructure service which is used widely in Finland. It is also a building block for Artificial Intelligence services.

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen is the director of two research infrastructures of the Finnish Research Infrastructure Roadmap (2014–2020), namely FinELib and Finna. 

She is the former President and current special adviser of LIBER, the Association of European Research Libraries. Fostering Open Science is a priority of LIBER, which represents ca. 440 research libraries across 40 countries in Europe. LIBER has been actively fostering Open Science especially in the fields of Open Access, Research Data Management, FAIR Data, Digital Humanities, as well as leadership and skills development. Advocacy related to the copyright reform, raising awareness, building strategic partnerships and being active in EU projects related to Open Science are also among the duties of LIBER.

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen is a member of the Open Science Policy Platform of the European Commission. She is the only person representing libraries in the expert group. The mandate of the OSPP is to advice the Commission on Open Science policy; to practically implement the European Open Science Policy Agenda; improve the quality and impact of European scientific research across member states and internationally; to identify related stakeholder groups. The OSPP consists of 25 high-level representatives of European Open Science stakeholders. The OSPP has published recommendations in 2018 that cover the eight priorities of the Commission.

She has been a member of steering committees of the Open Science and Research Initiative as well as the National Digital Library in Finland. The Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture coordinated the Open Science and Research Initiative (ATT) for the term 2014–2017. The objective was for Finland to become one of the leading countries in Open Science and Research and to ensure the possibilities of Open Science are widely utilised in our society. The National Digital Library of Finland developed the availability and usability of digital cultural heritage; preservation of digital cultural heritage; digitisation of cultural heritage and collaboration between libraries, archives, and museums. The National Library of Finland is responsible for the development of the National Discovery Service Finna (finna.fi). Based on external evaluation, Finna has been the most successful of the NDL services.

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen is also a member of the Digital Heritage Expert Group and she has been a member of the Europeana board and the Europeana executive committee during 2010–2015. The mandate of the Digital Heritage Expert Group is to assist the Commission in relation to the implementation of existing EU legislation, programmes, and policies; to coordinate with the member states, exchange of views; give guidance on Europeana, in particular the general objectives, priorities for actions, and the envisaged level of funding to be proposed for the Europeana core service platform and generic services in the annual Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) work programmes. 

She is a member of the Finnish Research Information Hub - a new window into Finnish research for the term 2017–2020.

Kristiina Hormia-Poutanen has extensive national and international networks related to Open Science (Open Access, research data management, research infrastructures, skills development, libraries, consortia); open innovation and open discovery.

Presentation:

International Collaboration Boosting Open Science

Open Science is being implemented in many countries in Europe. Research is global and also the development of policies, infrastructures, sharing of best practices etc. must happen in international collaboration. Various platforms and organisations -Open Science Policy Platform, Liber, LERU, OA2020 initiative and licensing consortia to mention a few-  support the transition towards Open Science. 

Finland aims to be a leading country in Open Science. The development of the basic building blocks was started already in 2010 in a national initiative. In 2018 the responsibility of national coordination of Open Science was given to the Federation of Learned Societies in accordance with the recommendations of the Open Science Policy Platform.

The presentation will discuss European and national level policies and give some practical examples of implementing Plan S principles. 

Prof. Barend Mons, GO FAIR, CODATA

Barend Mons is a global expert on FAIR principles and he led the 5 day long early meeting in January 2014 (Leiden) where the principles were first defined. Originally a molecular biologist with 15 years of basic  research experience on malaria parasites and vaccines, he refocused in 2000 on semantic technologies and later on Open Science. He has thus been in this field from the very beginning and started various early movements for open science ‘avant la lettre’ (a.o. Wiki professional, Concept Web Alliance). Mons published over 100 peer reviewed articles and more recently a handbook named: Data Stewardship for Open Science. He was the senior author on the now widely cited FAIR principles paper in Nature’s Scientific Data in 2016.

In 2015, Barend was appointed Chair of the High Level Expert Group (HLEG) for the European Open

Science Cloud, and the group published its report, which marked a critical step towards realising the

aspiration of the EOSC. After leaving the HLEG he continued to be active towards the practical realisation of

the EOSC, defined in the report as the Internet of FAIR data and services. Three countries (The Netherlands,

Germany and France) took the early initiative to create a Global, Open approach to the implementation of

FAIR principles in practice, called GO FAIR, with the aim to kick-start the developments towards EOSC in a

global, open science and innovation context. Mons was appointed director for the Dutch International Support

and Coordination Office of the infinitive with sister offices in Germany and France. 

He is also the elected president of CODATA, the standing committee on research data related issues of the International Science Council. Barend is a member of the Netherlands Academy of Technology and Innovation(ACTI). He is also the European representative in the Board on research Data and Information (BRDI) of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine in the USA.

Presentation:

The Internet for Social Machines 

We are in a transition phase of science, where machines (mainly computers) have become our

major research assistants. Humans and computers increasingly work together as ‘social machines’ to makes

sense of complex natural phenomena. However, computers need a very different input as compared to

people and the way we adapt the communication and reuse of our research results is adopting to this new

situation only at glacial speed. Still, the 15 FAIR Principles, published in 2016, dealing with machine

actionable data and services, have found unusually rapid uptake among a broad spectrum of stakeholders,

from research scientists who create and reuse data, to publishers who distribute data, to science funders

who track impact of data. Barend will describe the FAIR Principles and show examples of how they have

been implemented. He will also present a set of core FAIR Metrics that can help gauge the level of FAIRness

of any digital resource. Of particular interest is how additional FAIR Metrics can (and should) be defined to

address community-specific data structures and analytic requirements. This discussion, and these examples

will be presented in the context of the International GO FAIR Initiative. GO FAIR is a voluntary community of

stakeholders devoted to implementation solutions of an emerging Internet of FAIR Data and Services.

Vanessa Produman, SPARC Europe

Vanessa Proudman is Director of SPARC Europe; she is working to make Open the default in Europe. Vanessa has 20 years’ international experience working with many leading university libraries worldwide, with research institutions, international policy makers, together with information and IT professionals and designers from many countries. She also headed information and IT at a UN ­affiliated international research institution in Vienna for 10 years. She has also been programme and project manager to Europeana. She is also the owner of Proud2Know, a consultancy that supports the development of Europe’s academic libraries.

Presentation:

Insights into European research funder Open policies and practices: A Snapshot

This presentation will describe the results of a research study called the RIF Project that gleans insights into the various patterns of rewards and incentives being employed by European research funders to encourage open access to publications and research data and openness in research assessment for the research they fund. Funders across Europe are using scholarly communications to increase the impact of their grant results, thereby incentivizing researchers to share their research more openly. More than 60 funders responded to a survey that was conducted in early Spring 2019 coming from key international funding bodies, national funding agencies, major charities and foundations, and national academies and from over 25 countries. The study is being led by SPARC Europe in consultation with Science Europe, ALLEA and the EFC. The survey is the first of its kind, also to include academies, foundations and charities in Europe. 

What kinds of policy choices have funders made to influence how grantees increase open access to their research results with as few restrictions as possible? How can funders contribute to changing the research evaluation system by exploring ways to evaluate the intrinsic value of research beyond the impact factor for example; promoting, and considering a wider range of types of research when evaluating grants. What internal evaluation processes come with that? Can funders stimulate grantees to disseminate a wide range of research more broadly, also for re-use, and encourage its discoverability? How are funders contributing to the investment in open, be it through financing open access journal articles and other material, and supporting infrastructure? 

The presentation will provide answers to these questions by sharing some of the survey’s high level results, firstly reporting on types of Open Access and Open Science policies amongst a range of funders to frame the other incentives. We will then go into how funders are currently funding Open Access publications, as well as Open Access and research data development, services or infrastructure. Furthermore, we will outline what grant evaluation criteria are used when evaluating the research funders fund or wish to fund and for indications for innovation in this process, e.g. asking how far they endorse initiatives such as the Leiden Manifesto or DORA and where Open Science is and is not included in that process. The project will end by delving into areas of the study that inform on certain principles of Plan S.

This research will help raise awareness of the range of opportunities to funders with Open Science to help them and their grantees increase access, visibility and impact of their research results on health, industry and society. For libraries, more rewards and incentives amongst funders in Europe clearly endorses the Open Science work we have been leading on for many years. More development in this area also promises to have positive consequences on helping libraries achieve more open access to research results as seen with the REF in the UK or with Horizon 2020. Note that Plan S, established in Sept 2018, is a key engine for funders to provide more immediate OA to research. Plan S can go hand in hand with studies like the RIF Project that can contribute to showing trends, gaps and good practices to inform and motivate more funders to embrace Open Science in policy and practice on various levels. We hope to tell you how.

Dr. Anna Wałek, Gdańsk University of Technology

AAnna Wałek is an experienced library manager, expert in the field of open access to scientific resources (Open Access), digital libraries as well as organization and management of a scientific library.

A graduate of the Institute of Information and Library Science at the University of Wroclaw, where she obtained a PhD in the field of Library and Information Science in 2013.

In the years 2007-2016 she worked at the Wrocław University of Technology, where in 2013 as the Rector's Proxy for Organization of the Center for Scientific and Technical Information (CWINT) she developed the concept of organization and functioning of a new university unit, combining the functions of a university library, units responsible for university cooperation with the economy, technology transfer and intellectual property management. From January 2014, she was the first director of CWINT and the director of the Libraries of the Wrocław University of Technology. From November 2014, she was also appointed the manager of the Knowledge Repository Project of the Wrocław University of Technology. In 2014-2015 she was responsible for the implementation of the project Environmental Library of Exact and Technical Sciences for the Need of Innovative Economy (BIBLIOTECH), financed by the European Union under the Innovative Economy Operational Program.

Since January 2017, she has been the Director of the Library of the Gdańsk University of Technology, transforming it into a modern scientific library, providing innovative services for the scientific community, including the Open Science Competence Center and the Library Welcome Center, and engaging in national and international projects and initiatives .

Member of the Board of Directors IATUL (International Association of University Libraries), SPARC Europe Board of Directors, Task Force Open Science CESAER (Conference of European Schools for Advanced Engineering Education and Research), as well as Research Data Alliance.

Plenipotentiary of the Rector of the Gdańsk University of Technology for open science during the 2016-2020 term,

Substantive coordinator of the Bridge of Data project and Open Access Expert in the Bridge of Knowledge project - implemented by the Gdańsk University of Technology, financed by the Digital Poland Operational Program.

Project manager of the "Improving the didactic competence of academic teachers of the Gdańsk University of Technology" project financed from the Operational Program Knowledge, Education Development, and also the GUT manager of the "BE OPEN European forum and oBsErvatory for OPEN science in transport" project financed under the HORIZON 2020 program.

Presentation:

Open Science policies in Poland

Plan S is an initiative for Open Access publishing that was launched in September 2018. The plan is supported by cOAlition S, an international consortium of research funders. One of the signatories of PlanS and members of the consortium is the Polish National Science Center, which in its financed projects successively introduces a policy of openness to scientific publications and research data.

Also in 2015, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education issued the document "Directions of development of open access to publications and research results in Poland", recommending to scientific institutions and universities to implement institutional open access policies.

The presentation will present the historical outline of the introduction of open access policy in Poland and the current state of its implementation. 

Dr. Peter Kraker, Open Knowledge Maps

Dr. Peter Kraker is the founder and chairman of Open Knowledge Maps, a charitable non-profit dedicated to dramatically increasing the visibility of research findings for science and society alike. A long-time open science advocate, he is known for coining the term Open Methodology and for his leading role in creating The Vienna Principles – A Vision for Scholarly Communication in the 21st Century. Peter is a member of the GO FAIR executive board, coordinator of the GO FAIR Implementation Network on Discovery, and a core team member of the Open Science Network Austria (OANA). Prior to founding Open Knowledge Maps, Peter was a senior researcher at Know-Center, Austria’s leading research center for data-driven business and big data analytics, managing the topic of Open Science.

Presentation:

Open Knowledge Maps - Discovery for an Open Science 

Getting an overview of a research field and being able to identify a set of relevant findings pertaining to one’s information need are prerequisites for research, evidence-based practice and self-directed learning alike. Yet, the tools for exploring and discovering scientific content are often lacking. With traditional, list-based search engines, users have to examine articles and their relationships by hand, which is a time-consuming process. Open Knowledge Maps is an attempt to transform discovery of scientific knowledge by providing an open, community-driven non-profit system that leverages the digital open science ecosystem. Instead of lists, we propose to use knowledge maps for discovery. Knowledge maps provide an instant overview of a field by showing the main areas of the field at a glance, and papers related to each area. This makes it possible to easily identify useful, pertinent information. On our website https://openknowledgemaps.org, users can currently create a knowledge map for a topic of their choice based on more than 150 million scientific outputs. With this service, we have created a lot of enthusiasm in the community. Our user base has quickly grown: since our launch in May 2016, we have recorded over half a million visits to the site and more than 120,000 maps have been created. Open Knowledge Maps has become an international collaboration with team members, advisors and partners from variety of fields, including research, librarianship, design, software development, citizen science, and the open knowledge and open science movement.

Ghislain Onestas, Ex Libris

Ghislain Onestas works with Ex Libris’ team of Solution Experts advising customers on aspects of Ex Libris solutions and how they can be used to solve problems of librarianship around the areas of teaching, learning and research. As a subject matter expert, Ghislain works closely with customers to define their issues and identify the optimal resolution to them. Prior to joining Ex Libris, Ghislain worked for Clarivate Analytics as Customer Education Specialist.

Presentation

Putting the library at the heart of research

Many in the academia recognize the need for a better, more integrated approach for managing research assets throughout the research cycle – a systematic data management approach that will eliminate duplication of effort, reduce the burden on individual stakeholders and – above all – would support the institutional goal of increasing the impact of

research output.

Academic libraries are increasing their involvement in supporting research output and improving research data management, and in many institutions are already bringing coherence to the way that these are managed. In this session, we will discuss the potential role that libraries can play in driving this transition, by leveraging their expertise in data curation, resource management, and content dissemination, and the infrastructure needed for supporting these processes. We will aim to inspire a conversation around the need for a new, comprehensive approach to research data services. The session will also look at a possible

solution via a new library–led initiative being launched (Ex Libris Esploro) that brings together a

number of universities and Ex Libris in order to develop a new approach to increase visibility,

impact and compliance of research outputs and data while serving the multiple stakeholders.