UW Libraries Blog

October 15, 2021

UW Libraries Observes International Open Access Week: October 25-29th, 2021

UW Libraries

Join us in celebrating OA Week this month by attending events and discovering services offered by the UW Libraries. Schedule of events below.

“Open Science should play a significant role in ensuring equity among researchers from developed and developing countries, enabling fair and reciprocal sharing of scientific inputs and outputs and equal access to scientific knowledge to both producers and consumers of knowledge regardless of location, nationality, race, age, gender, income, socio-economic circumstances, career stage, discipline, language, religion, disability, ethnicity or migratory status or any other grounds.”

UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science, 2021

International Open Access Week (OA Week) is an annual week of organized action that advocates for increased access to research for all people around the world. This year’s theme, It Matters How We Open Knowledge: Building Structural Equity, intentionally highlights the significance of centering equity in these efforts to make research open to all.

In our 2018-2023 Strategic Plan, the UW Libraries committed to advancing research for the public good on our campus by:

  • Increasing access to and improving dissemination of UW scholarship by leading the development of institutional open access publishing, resources and technologies.
  • Advancing digital and interdisciplinary scholarship by collaboratively investing in infrastructure and leveraging expertise in new areas of research support.

Four years into our Strategic Plan, the UW Libraries have taken significant steps in supporting that strategic direction. Last fall, the UW Libraries launched the Open Scholarship Commons (OSC), a central hub where everyone, regardless of disciplinary home, can come together to learn new concepts and technology skills, create new knowledge, and share it openly with others. The OSC is centered on the values of equity, experimentation, flexibility, openness, and technology. Learn more about the work of the OSC and how UW Libraries are supporting students and faculty 

The UW Libraries believes that the University’s “research attains its greatest impact on our most pressing global challenges when we advocate for open, public, and emerging forms of scholarship,” and we invite you to join us in celebrating OA Week this month by attending events and discovering services offered by the UW Libraries and our OSC that can help us all work more openly. See below for a schedule of UW Libraries-sponsored events that will be taking place virtually during OA Week. These events will not be recorded. 

Turning Dissertations Into Articles: A Case Study With the University of Nairobi and Moi University- Monday, 10/25/2021, 2:00 – 3:00 pm

Supported by a UW Global Innovation Fund grant, librarians partnered with faculty at the School of Dentistry and DeRouen Center to instruct 10 phd recipients in turning their dissertations into a publishable manuscript. Through a 10 week course, the instructors aimed to increase competencies and knowledge of the publishing system, covering how to do a lit review, the publishing ecosystem, open access, journal impact factor, submission guidelines, working with an editor, using a citation manager, copyright and contracts, and creating an author profile. Three of the students are close to being finished, and a few more are not far behind. A grant of $10,000 will supply approximately four students with APC fees to publish open access.

Event Information

ResearchWorks: An Introduction to UW Libraries’ Institutional Repository- Tuesday, 10/26/21, 2:00 – 3:00 pm

ResearchWorks is the University of Washington Libraries’ Institutional Repository, which is used to house theses, dissertations, articles, data, and other digital materials that are created by UW faculty and researchers. This workshop will explain what ResearchWorks is used for, how to deposit your materials, and how using ResearchWorks for manuscripts and data can meet publishing requirements by funders and publishers. A demonstration will be included, and there will be time for questions.

Register here

Introduction to Persistent Identifiers- Wednesday, 10/27/21, 1:00 – 2:00 pm

Learn about three tools the UW Libraries provides to help researchers provide persistent identification for publications, digital objects, and themselves.

  • DataCite creates a persistent web address (called a digital object identifier, or DOI) for a web resource. Even if you need to move the storage location for the object, the address will not change. Many publishers require DOIs upon article and data submission.
  • Perma.cc is used to take a snapshot and store a version of a web resource. If you’re writing an article and want to reference a page as it existed on a specific date, such as a newspaper front page, this tool will provide the link and the storage.
  • ORCiD provides a persistent digital ID that distinguishes you from every other researcher and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between you and your professional activities ensuring that your work is recognized. Some publishers require authors to have an ORCiD.

Register here

Introduction to Open Science Framework: Online Collaboration, Organization and Sharing- Thursday, 10/28/21, 10:00 – 11:00 am 

Join the Scholarly Communications and Publishing staff for an introduction to the online collaborative tool Open Science Framework. OSF is a tool that promotes open, centralized workflows by enabling capture of different aspects and products of the research lifecycle, including developing a research idea, designing a study, storing and analyzing collected data, and writing and publishing reports or papers. It can be used for collaboration or individual work, and allows for sharing of all or parts of a project. The workshop will include a short presentation of OSF, with hands-on time to create an OSF profile and see first-hand how useful this tool can be. 

Register here

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