All Office of Scholarly Communication courses

What’s new in Open Access for 2019?

Open Access is a fast moving area but it can be hard to find time to keep up with the latest developments. This session offers a brief update on the biggest changes both within Cambridge and the wider world in the last year.

Join us for the fourth in our series exploring resources to help with the process of publishing your research in STEM disciplines - from recording observations to editing to peer review.

This session offers the chance to learn about available tools and options in publishing and reviewing, and ask questions of the experts.

Featuring contributions from:

• independent and not-for-profit media outlet The Conversation (Miriam Frankel)
• local solutions with Cambridge University Press (Chris Harrison)
• Aperta and changing the way we publish with PLOS (Nicola Stead)
• Open Access with Scholastica (Brian Cody)

and more!

Morning refreshments and lunch will be provided, during which time you can speak to providers for information and user support.

We will be recording and sharing these presentations for all those who are unable to attend on the day.

You can find a programme for this event here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1j07XgHK5MOfLcvVZiIf3xnoGI0EcgJr1hRWIaO0AUDI/edit?usp=sharing

Thanks to PLOS for their sponsorship of this event.

Join the OSC for an introduction to Open Access

Open Access can be complicated, especially when you're dealing with researchers from across disciplines. This introductory session on Open Access is specifically tailored to the needs of Cambridge college library staff working with a range of different users although anyone wanting a refresher on Open Access is welcome to attend.

The first in our "Librarian Toolkit" webinar series on Open Access will cover topics such as what Open Access is, why it's important and how college librarians can support their users in sharing their work.

With open access now a mainstay of culture in most disciplines, we look at what lays beyond. What challenges remain and how can they be addressed? How can scholarly communication evolve to best serve the needs of researchers in a variety of disciplines? There will be four sessions through the day, looking at..

Further than privileged institutions. Many OA conversations are centred on research institutions in Europe and North America, where there is abundant funding for both reading and publishing and significant power to influence. Institutions like Cambridge risk favouring solutions that disadvantage less privileged researchers. We want to hear the voices of researchers who work outside this framework to make sure we move towards solutions that truly serve everyone.

Further than the Article/Book processing charge. The APC model is coming to dominate the OA landscape, but is it helping us to fulfil the benefits promised by open access? Are BPCs sustainable and inclusive? Are there better ways of financing open access publishing?

Further than publish or perish. Many researchers are dissatisfied with a culture that rewards publications above all else and sets up perverse incentives. What alternatives are there, and can we make them work in practice? How should Cambridge approach the hiring and promotion of researchers?

Further than traditional publishing. The article format evolved at a time when journals circulated as print copies. In the digital era, can we do better? If we could design the ideal format for research publications, what would it look like? What models have been proposed so far, and how are they working?

For the full programme of sessions and accessibility information, please see our events page: https://osc.cam.ac.uk/open-access-where-next

Have you ever wondered who can access your research? Most articles and research outputs are locked up behind paywalls inside an ivory tower. Find out how to make your practice more open to reach a broader audience, spark collaborations and, most importantly, improve the quality of your research.

The OSC is delighted to bring you a lunchtime screening of the documentary that has taken Open Access issues to the big screen.

Paywall: The Business of Scholarship is a documentary which focuses on the need for open access to research and science, questions the rationale behind the $25.2 billion a year that flows into for-profit academic publishers, examines the 35-40% profit margin associated with the top academic publisher Elsevier and looks at how that profit margin is often greater than some of the most profitable tech companies like Apple, Facebook and Google.

Bring your lunch and enjoy some popcorn!

Everyone is welcome to attend this free event: visit our booking page.

The principles of Plan S are set to change what funders require from researchers, placing a much greater emphasis on immediate Open Access and other open practices. While we've been busy preparing here in the UK, our colleagues in the US have not been idle.

Micah Vandegrift is the Open Knowledge Librarian at NC State University Libraries, where he works on community-building and advocating for Open Research. He will be sharing his perspective on the likely impact of Plan S on libraries, publishers, researchers and repositories.

Format: 20-30 minutes talk, followed by an opportunity to discuss these issues with others in the room.

Refreshments will be available from 11:30. Join us for an informal chat before the talk.

Resources: if you would like to refresh your knowledge of Plan S before the seminar, check out our Plan S Factsheet (https://osc.cam.ac.uk/files/copy_of_plan_s.pdf) and webinar (https://osc.cam.ac.uk/training/supporting-researchers-21st-century-programme/wednesday-webinars).

You've published your research...now what should you do with it? It seems we are expected to share more and more online, which can be both daunting and exciting. In this session we will look carefully at the benefits and barriers to sharing research, giving you an opportunity to consider a strategy that will work for you.

This session explores the whys and hows of sharing research - the options, the benefits and the logistics:

• Your aims and motivations for disseminating research
• Opportunities for sharing offered by social media and traditional media
• Pitfalls when creating an online presence
• Ways to find out who has been sharing, using and citing your published research

You've published your research...now what should you do with it?

This session explores the whys and hows of sharing research - the options, the benefits and the logistics.

Explore:

• Scholarly best practice for sharing research
• Opportunities for sharing offered by social media
• Benefits that sharing your research brings you and the wider community
• What your funder expects you to share.
• How to use the University repository, Apollo, to share your research and also access that of others
• Ways to find out who has been sharing, using and citing your published research

• Where should you publish your research?
• What publishing format should you choose?

This session looks at the things you need to consider in order to reach your audience effectively, including:

• Indicators to use to assess the appropriateness of a journal for your research - Journal Impact Factor, publisher fees and publication times
• Who should own the copyright to your work?
• How you can use other people’s copyrighted material

• Where should you publish your research?
• What publishing format should you choose?

This session looks at the things you need to consider in order to reach your audience effectively, including:

• Indicators to use to assess the appropriateness of a journal for your research - Journal Impact Factor, publisher fees and publication times
• Who should own the copyright to your work?
• How you can use other people’s copyrighted material

The University’s one-year Rights Retention pilot has taught the library a great deal about the practicalities of supporting self-archiving through rights retention. In a meeting in November 2022, the Research Policy Committee considered the findings from the pilot so far and endorsed the development of a self-archiving policy for researchers. We would like to invite you to attend a briefing session to gather your feedback.

Dear esteemed author...

So-called predatory publishers regularly approach researchers via email to solicit manuscripts and conference papers. With the emphasis on publishing as a measure of academic success still strong it can be easy to give in to temptation and flattery but this can do more harm than good to a future career.

This session will look at whether these publishers are a problem, how to spot a potential problem publisher or conference and the best advice to offer researchers if they are approached.

Many researchers consider publishing a book, often in the form of a monograph, and the process can be daunting the first time around. You will get the starter-kit to get your idea off the ground, with a collection of tips and tools to make your life easier. By the end of the session, you'll have the basic knowledge -and more importantly the confidence- to take your publishing project further.

Have your say to help us negotiate the best possible read and publish agreement with Springer Nature.

UK Universities are negotiating with Springer Nature with the aim to reach a sustainable and affordable read and publish deal. Read more.

Experts from Jisc will facilitate discussions with small groups of Cambridge researchers about your experience with the publishing process and how you get access to the materials you read. By taking part, you will help to shape the approach to negotiations and communications over the next few months. This will also be an opportunity to deepen your understanding of how the negotiations are conducted, the issues involved in academic publishing, and the way colleagues in different disciplines approach these questions.

This course covers the practical steps you need to take in order to ensure that work submitted for publication by University of Cambridge researchers is compliant for REF2021.

We will introduce the principles of open access and open research, and guide you through the necessary steps to meet the open access requirements of REF2021. We will demonstrate key processes for uploading work to Symplectic, including choosing the right version of a work to upload. There will be plenty of time in the session to ask questions.

This course will be useful to you if you:

• administer the uploading of research outputs to Symplectic Elements to make them open access
• manage Symplectic profiles

Open research not only furthers the global reach of your work, it accelerates the pursuit of knowledge and fosters truly international collaboration. The University of Cambridge promotes and supports open research, so how do you embed open research into your working practices?

The Office of Scholarly Communication invites you to learn more about exciting initiatives in the life and social sciences that are already changing research culture by enabling collaboration, improving access to knowledge, and putting transparency and reproducibility at the forefront of research.

• Professor Chris Chambers (University of Cardiff) will introduce Registered Reports, a format of preregistered empirical publication in which peer review happens prior to data collection and analysis. Registered Reports aim to eradicate a variety of questionable research practices, including low statistical power, selective reporting of results, and publication bias, while allowing complete flexibility to report serendipitous findings. The initiative has been taken up by over 190 journals, including Cortex, outlets in the Nature group, generalist journals including Royal Society Open Science, and emerging clinical trial formats. Professor Chambers will discuss early evidence of impacts on the field and emerging Registered Report funding models in which journals and funders simultaneously assess proposed protocols.

• Professor Benedict Jones (University of Glasgow) leads the first Psychological Science Accelerator project, a globally distributed network of psychological science laboratories (currently over 400), representing over 50 countries on all six populated continents, that coordinates data collection for democratically selected studies. Discover how this diverse and inclusive project is accelerating the accumulation of reliable and generalizable evidence in psychological science, reducing the distance between truth about human behavior and mental processes and our current understanding.

Our speakers will also explore a range of allied initiatives, including the newly established UK Reproducibility Network. We will invite you to share your own experiences, questions and ideas.

Join us at 3pm for afternoon tea and a chance to network with our speakers and open advocates from the University community. Talks will begin at 3.30pm.

Researchers and students can now not only make their code and data available for their academic papers, but also enable others to reproduce the results with a single-click.

Code Ocean is an easy-to-use executable repository and reproducibility platform that facilitates replication and reuse of research code. This demo will provide an overview of the Code Ocean platform and explore benefits such as:

• preservation code will work today, tomorrow, next week, next year

• advanced tech suite of tools which follow reproducibility best practices

• impact enable easy reuse of code to extend research

• collaboration code is easy to share and discover.

Lunch will be provided.

Are you new to research data management or in need of a refresher? Join the OSC for a recap of all things RDM in an accessible one hour workshop.

This session will feature a whistle stop tour through the dos and don'ts of RDM in order to give attendees a brief overview of some of the major issues.

This session is being offered in conjunction with the new course Managing Data Management: Getting Started with Data Management Plan Support. The courses may be taken separately or as a pair to suit the needs of the individual learner.

PREVENT RESEARCH DISASTERS THROUGH GOOD DATA MANAGEMENT

• How much data would you lose if your laptop was stolen?
• Have you ever emailed your colleague a file named 'final_final_versionEDITED'?
• Do you know what your funder expects you to do with your research data?

As a researcher, you will encounter research data in many forms, ranging from measurements, numbers and images to documents and publications.

Whether you create, receive or collect this information, you will need to organise it.

Managing digital information properly is a complex issue. Doing it correctly from the start could save you a lot of time and hassle when preparing a publication or writing up your thesis.

• Do you manage and share software for research?
• Are you encountering problems when managing research code?
• Is current best practice working for you and your group - or not?
• Would you like to discuss solutions for these problems with other researchers and research software experts?

Jisc, in collaboration with SSI, University of Cambridge, University of Sheffield, University of Bath, University of Leicester, University of Birmingham, the British Library and STFC are inviting all researchers interested and passionate about developing or using research software to join a workshop on this subject.

• Bookings cannot be taken through UTBS. To book a place on this course please visit http://bit.ly/researchsoftwarebook

What's new in scholarly communication for 2018?

The world of scholarly communication and research support is a fast moving one. Many different external developments can influence local practices but the speed can make it hard to keep up. Join the OSC for this short and accessible webinar which outlines some of the key developments in the scholarly communication landscape over the last year including the launch of Plan S, the breakdown of negotiations with Elsevier in Europe and the current copyright lawsuits against ResearchGate.

The webinar will be delivered live and a recording will be made available. If you are unable to make the live session but would like access to the recording please register as normal.

Have you produced your own software? Did you know you can decide how others can reuse and share it? Do you know that there are a range of licences that you could apply to your work that determine how it can be used?

This workshop will explore why you should licence your software clearly and how to do so. A range of different licences will be explained as well as tools that can help you decide. Join the Research Data Management Facility and Neil Chue Hong from the Software Sustainability Institute to talk in detail about software licences.

Nothing with copyright is ever simple, so how do you know where to start?

From the fair dealing to sharing your research online, it seems that nothing with copyright is ever simple. There are few black and white rules about copyright but there are consequences for getting something wrong!

This webinar will cover some of the most common grey areas in copyright such as fair dealing and expiry dates and offer librarians some strategies to make decisions and help advise their research community on copyright issues.

We want to hear YOUR views on training. Are you struggling to find high-quality online resources? Looking forward to some live sessions to break the boredom? Fed up of training altogether? Whatever your thoughts are, we'd love to hear them.

Following the lockdown, the way we offer training has changed radically and we want to make sure that we are still meeting your needs. Come along for an informal chat with colleagues from Researcher Development and Cambridge University Libraries to help shape our programmes for the next academic year and beyond.

This is also a chance for you to reflect on your professional development and discuss it with other students and with experts. You will hear how other PhD students from a variety of disciplines approach their professional development. You will also find out more about what training opportunities exist at Cambridge.

This session will be held online via MS Teams, you will receive joining instructions the day before the session.