Title: Supporting Research Dissemination
1Supporting Research Dissemination
- John MacCollEuropean Director, RLG Partnership
- James ToonERIS Project ManagerEdinburgh
University LibraryRLG Partnership Annual
Meeting, Chicago, June 2010
2Context
3Minnesota anthropological approach
4Actionable intelligence Assisted thinking
- Analysis and synthesis of the available evidence
base - Improved understanding for library management
oclc.org/research/publications/library/2009/2009-0
2.pdf
5Breaking behaviours down by discipline
browsing collecting
re-reading
assembling consulting
note-taking
Adapted from C. Palmer, L. Teffau, C. Pirmann
(2009)
6RIM overlapping environments
7Meeting researchers needs
8RIN
9Ithaka
10UCB
11Our joint project with UK Research Information
Network Support for research workflows
12New elements to our study
- Focus on dissemination excluding traditional
journal and monograph publishing - Focus on subject librarians/faculty liaisons
- Focus on repository support for scholarship
13Enhancing Repository Infrastructure in Scotland
14Scotland and Open Access
15Some history Scottish Collaboration in Open
Access
- History of collaborative activity (i.e. SCURL,
SHEDL, SDLC, IRIScotland, ERIS) - Open Access as a reaction to the scholarly
communications crisis - Open Access meeting 11th October 2004, Royal
Society of Edinburgh - Scottish Declaration on Open Access launched at
that meeting (OATS) - First joint OA project IRIScotland funded by JISC
June 2005 and ran until 2008
16Scope, aims and objectives
- Development, assessment and engagement of user
communities - Raise issues surrounding the longevity and
broader value of research output - Attending to the demand side, technologically
- Strategic recommendations, business planning and
sustainability
17Scottish toes in the water
18ERIS Use case Research Pooling (1)
- Formed after 2001 Research Assessment Exercise
- Subject to massive investment by Scottish HEI,
Scottish Funding Council and others - Demonstrated value following 2008 Research
Assessment Exercise - Specific needs for reporting and strategic
development - More than 383 million invested to date across13
initiatives.
19ERIS Use case Research Pooling (2)
- Are research pools representative of specific
disciplinary needs? - Assessment of pooling performance indicators
- Identify and understand information drivers
- Review of research pool (meta)data needs plus
gap analysis against existing repository
landscape - Develop virtual repository space to facilitate
reporting
20A few findings from our work
http//www.flickr.com/photos/adambot/2733161467/
21Levels of engagement
- 69.7 (216) of respondents were aware of the
existence of a repository - 44.8 (139) have deposited something in their
repository, with 80 finding it either very easy,
or easy to do.
22Levels of engagement
- However on average, only 15 submit to their IR
as a matter of course as well as to publishers
15
23Levels of engagement
- Repositories are being used for research, but
very rarely are they used directly. - Normally via referral (43 via search engine, and
16 referral from colleague
24From focus group work (some key points) open
access
- Researchers generally see repositories as being
there to support their institutions support for
OA - Personally they are generally supportive of OA,
but there are pros and cons and no single
convincing argument (and dont think their should
be) - Researchers have been doing OA if they wanted
to for years now, by fair means or foul! - Variation in support across career paths (early
career to senior academic) - The drive to OA can be damaging in some cases
25From focus group work (some key points)
- The pressure to publish in recognised journals is
significant, and is an administrative and career
need (in the UK at least) - Must have ability to exercise personal control
over everything that is in the repository (to
provide or revoke access at will) - Repositories dont offer anything that the
researcher finds sufficiently of value to
motivate deposit. - Library providers are disconnected from the
researchers real needs (as far as researchers are
concerned)
26Long term availability and reuse of research
- Those responsible for service and support are
unequipped - Low awareness of digital curation and
preservation issues, and little to no practical
experience - Policies that do exist are part of corporate
initiatives and are often box ticking exercises - Domain specific guidance for preservation and
curation policy tends to sit outside of the
institution, indicating issues of leadership and
direction
27Long term availability and reuse of research
- Those responsible for research are unequipped
- Open access is easy in relation insert your
term here curation is hard. - Potentially huge overhead for the researcher
- Services for preservation and curation support
are generally lacking - We can't stand on the shoulders of giants if we
only have access to their knees1 - Growing support for principle of open
scholarship, but requires change in philosophy,
not practice.
1. Quote from Vision Learning Blog, may 24th 2010
http//visionlearningcommunity.blogspot.com/2010/0
5/journal-nature-continues-open-access.html
28Indication of the scale of the issue
29Indication of the scale of the issue
63
30Research pooling
- Not just for assessment, but for effective
strategic management of research - Genuine desire for full text and bibliographic
data for knowledge management (KT really
important) - Have strong backing from their members.
Discipline trumps institution. - Data must be broader than just IR need to
include HR, Finance, Knowledge data, Grant data,
Funder data. - They know they want data, but they dont know
what they want or how to define it.
31A few observations (not conclusions)
- Systems and services not based on user needs
- Repository use often by accident
- There is no single approach every
institution/discipline/researcher is different - Its all about me, me, me.
- We can often talk in a foreign language
- We can often not talk at all
- Failure to add value has meant that we had to
resort to mandates/requirements sticks not
carrots.
32What is the future of the repository?
- As it is are we heading the way of the Dodo?
- Must gain trust of the users
- Two clear paths support for knowledge and
research, and support for research management - Institutional repositories are only part of the
eco-system of systems servicing the research life
cycle
http//www.flickr.com/photos/44124372821_at_N01/16787
1469
33Work with users to gain trust and define direction
- Stakeholder communities are identifiable and
similar across Higher Education - Many varied needs.
- Roles and mission are however not universally
well defined in context. - Lack of internal support means they are often
looking outside their institutions for comfort. - Stakeholder groups want to collaborate and
communicate - Need greater facilitation. Opportunities for
national networks
34Develop roles and up-skill support services
- All through the ERIS exercise, the need for
effective research support has been key - Need to develop specialist roles to support the
research life cycle - Take a role in helping researchers with the
dissemination of knowledge - Work more closely together with research offices
as information specialists - Economies of scale in services need to be
considered for cost/benefit (unpopular)
35Support the dissemination of knowledge
- Open access is still a goal, but not THE goal
of repositories. Discuss. - Open scholarship/knowledge revolves around
effective curation of data. Discuss. - The coolest thing to do with your data will be
thought of by someone else1 - Being linked and being open is important (open
standards esp.) - How to engage in an open, social world.
Participate, collaborate and innovate not
reinvent the wheel.
1. Attributed to Rufus Pollack, via
http//blogs.talis.com/nodalities/2007/05/xtech_da
y_3_rufus_pollock_and_.php
36Research Information Management Systems
Image reproduced with kind permission of the
Universities of Aberdeen and St Andrews
37Make change to an objective, outcome based
approach.
- Programme of activity to develop enhanced
capability over time. - Investment in enabling activities
- Services for researchers
- Services for strategy and management
- Services for service managers
38The study
39Researcher behaviours
- This Working Group will look at the use of
repositories institutional and subject and
other venues where attention is focused by
various communities - It will examine social networking mechanisms for
dissemination, considering the spectrum of
community services grouped around research
activity (including informal community spaces,
blogs, blog aggregation services, microblogging,
etc ) - Faculty participants will also be asked about
tools and services not currently available that
they would value, at institutional and at domain
levels - Focus will be on the use of repositories, not
the deposit process
40Library responses
- How are changing researcher practices being
monitored by libraries? - What does the use of these tools and services
imply for libraries (eg in respect of harvesting,
curation, bibliometric services and
preservation)? - What new services should libraries provide (eg
bibliometric data reports generated from
repositories)? - Is there missing infrastructure that might
valuably connect discrete data sources to serve
research bibliographic and data curation needs? - How do libraries support scholarship rather than
administration?
41U Minnesota Karen Williams on changing faculty
liaison roles (ARL study) from new Position
Description Framework
Jim Neal Subject Librarian 2.0
42Nil desperandum Hugh Glaser (Computer
Scientist, U Southampton) email to
JISC-REPOSITORIES, 2 June 2010
- the pages the School was offering for me by
embedding my publication data in the official
profile pages was far superior to anything I
could make myself
43U Minnesota Karen Williams on changing faculty
liaison roles (ARL study)
44Process
45RLG-RIM SRD group Plan/Process (1)
- Identify and define scope of stakeholders and how
are they going to contribute to the project - Establish contact with contributing group
- Write and agree project definition work
- Arrange telcon to sign off approach with
stakeholders at end June - Project Website and social tools to be used for
user communication and collaboration - Set up and make available communication routes
- Set up simple communications plan by end June
46RLG-RIM SRD group Plan/Process (2)
- Liaison librarian engagement plan
- Agree data collection method, questions and
targets for work by end June - Prepare materials for project participants
- Prepare datasheets, questions, check-sheets etc
for data collection by mid July - Compiled, ordered data from sources
- Data returned, sorted and ordered by end August
- Mid August partner telcon to discuss progress and
push if necessary - Data analysis
- Review of collated data and order for reporting
by end Sept
47RLG-RIM SRD group Plan/Process (3)
- A Final report on the RLG/RIM SRD activity for
publication - First draft out for review by mid Oct.
- Partner telcon at end Oct to sign off report for
publication - Publication due mid November.
- Planning for alternative dissemination routes
- Set activities to promote final report
(presentations, blog posts) on ongoing basis - Closure report, identifying follow on actions
including handover and wind-down activities - Project wind down and hand over to RLG by end
November
48- Discussion!
- maccollj_at_oclc.orgjames.toon_at_ed.ac.uk
49Next up
- 400
- Lightning Rounds
- Buckingham