Open Access and the Value of An

Institutional RepositoryBy

Helena R. Asamoah-Hassan (Mrs.)University Librarian

at KNUST Open Access Week Seminar on 23rd October 2009

INTRODUCTION Open Access (OA)is subject of discussions in

recent times among stakeholders. OA has come in to save the situation of lack of

scholarly information in libraries –high cost journals and reduced budgets of libraries.

Currently about 10% of peer reviewed journals are OA journals.

However OA is seen by some as economically unsustainable, whilst others do not agree.

Various business models have been devised to make OA sustainable.

Definition of Open Access (OA) Free, online-copies of peer-reviewed journal

articles and conference papers as well as technical reports, theses and working papers.

In most cases, any user is free to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles.

In essence, these articles can be used freely for especially research and teaching purposes or as may be determined by the user.

There are several definitions but commonly used one is the Budapest Open Access Initiative

How OA is Provided Researcher can place his article in

Open Access Journal

Open Access Archive or Repository

In addition, he can place copies of the article in his Personal/department website

Why Open Access (OA)Journals

This is as a result of dissatisfaction by :

Academics/Authors that their work is not seen by all their peers – do not receive the recognition they deserve.

Readers who cannot view all research literature they need – less effective.

Libraries that cannot satisfy information needs of their users as cost of acquiring journals are going beyond their budget.

What OA Journal is

Publication of the full text of peer reviewed articles Publication of the full text of peer reviewed articles online that can be accessed by anyone globally via online that can be accessed by anyone globally via the internet witthe internet without paying any money. Great use to scholars in developing world

Authors may pay for putting their articles on Authors may pay for putting their articles on Open Access or theOpen Access or the department or research grants

may pay for the page charges.

Subsidies (government, institution, agencies) used Subsidies (government, institution, agencies) used to run it because it enables free exchange of to run it because it enables free exchange of scholarly information world wide.scholarly information world wide.

What OA Journal is It is an approach put together research results in

the hands of every prospective user.

Enables developing countries to have access to research output from the north.

Some on line journals are on Open Access and are increasing by the day.

This is against the traditional model where a library pays for access to the contents of a journal through a subscription

What OA Journal is -Summary

Makes research Freely available.

Makes research Publicly available.

Makes research Widely circulated.

Makes research Permanently available.

What is not OA

It is not self-publishing nor a way to by-pass peer-review.

It is not second-rated in any way.

Types of OA Development OA- Provide free access to institutions and

individuals in developing nations.

Hybrid OA - Enables authors or institutions open

access for specific articles.

Complete OA - Offers immediate access restrictions,

using article fees and grants

Archival OA - Permit authors to archive pre-/post print

institutional repository or own website.

Types of OA Delayed OA - Provides free access 6-12 months after

Online OA- Provide free access to online edition, with

subscriptions retained for print edition.

Limited Open Access- -- - Restrictions are placed on the contents. - Only back issues are available free. - Current issues are not available until after a certain period – popular in 6 months.

Benefits of OA Authors have global recognition since their Authors have global recognition since their

articles will be seen by readers world wide.articles will be seen by readers world wide.

Authors will be more cited in other articles.Authors will be more cited in other articles.

No need for subscription management activities No need for subscription management activities

for libraries.for libraries.

Funding is received by the journal from Funding is received by the journal from advertisers on their websiteadvertisers on their website..

Challenges of OA Finding means to exist since there are no

subscriptions.

Resistance from supporting institutions.

Restrictions may discourage potential readers so they will not go back to it.

Some subscribers may wait till after the 6 months in order to have it free, so loss of income so loss of income to publisher.

Some OA Journals Directory of Open Access Journals - Browse and

Search for Journals and Articles.

BioMed Central – 150 OA Journals Listed.

PubMed.

Scientific Electronic Library Online (sciELO).

PLoS.

Eprint.org- General information about OA and List of Archives

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)

DOAJ - www.doaj.org

- An indexing service for OA journals. - This service covers free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals. - Lists 3622 journals, Currently 1251 journals can be searched at article level - As at today 20,8831 articles are included in the DOAJ service.

Issues For & Against OA… OA is beneficial as research results are made

easily accessible and not restricted in commercial journals.

A Solution to journals subscription crisis of libraries.

OA has built in structures like for subscription journals, to ensure high quality reviewing.

Issues For & Against OA… OA will not protect the rights of authors, but it is

an effective means to make authors works very visible, more cited and not plagiarized. Who is therefore protected by the restriction?

The author pay model is too expensive for an individual to pay, unless payment is through research grants.

OA does not invest heavily in technological development, so no regular innovations.

Issues For & Against OA…

Professional societies or associations find OA unsustainable but it is a good way of making publishing by its members visible.

OA articles are not really free since some payment is still made at some stage to get it published.

Institutions with great research output pay more in the author-pay model while others with more emphasis on teaching pay nothing for using the information.

Issues For & Against OA… More research publications in OA Journals means

more payment by the institution and likely reduction in Library’s budgets.

OA needs a lot of marketing so that will increase cost of processing.

OA will neutralize the high quality expected of peer-reviewed articles because, of the ability to pay and get published model.

Importance of OA for the Ghanaian Researcher … The Ghanaian researcher depends on free

information sources from the north because of poor library budgets, few African world acclaimed scholarly journals, and limited research funding.

Open Access publishing is useful because it fills gaps in non-subscriptions provides full text articles allows immediate dissemination and access for all to

freely use allows for long term access to scholarly materials

Importance of OA for the Ghanaian Researcher

enables small libraries and those with small budgets to have access to greater amount of scholarly materials.

enables research carried out in the south to be made visible globally, and for collaboration.

bridges the digital divide.

Importance of OA for the Ghanaian Researcher

Assists faculty and researchers to increase their impact and visibility.

Improves the research profile of the institution.

Expectation for OA … OA concept is not widely known and its

ideals not greatly accepted in Africa.

Most of those who know about it are skeptical about its sustainability.

Negative attitude of ‘old brigade’ towards computers and their output.

Expectation for OA …Where: Ghanaian scholars will see OA as fastest and easiest means

for pushing their research results into the world.

All OA journals will be peer-reviewed, indexed and of general high quality.

Institutions will accept OA articles as peer-reviewed and of high quality and give them same weight as subscription ones.

There will be some OA publications in the stable of commercial publishers.

Expectation for OA … Where: Strong economic support for OA from Universities

and funding agencies will be present.

There will be no personal financial costs to authors in order to get published.

OA will fill scholarly journal gaps in libraries.

Through OA strong academic links (south-south and south –north) between researchers will be fostered.

Expectation for OA …Where: Adequate planning will be made before plunging

into OA publishing.

Many commercial publishers will release their hold on author’s right after publication to a comfortable period, if not scrapping it.

Stakeholders in the development information sector will agree on a sustainable model for free access.

The public will use OA profusely and so demand for more of them.

Expectation for OA … Where: Companies/Industries will fund OA journals to

enable researchers with high quality material but no funding to publish.

African Institutions will develop their own OSS for their OA journals having in mind their indigenous languages and materials.

Universities, research institutes, libraries and librarians in Africa will work together to create a central fund for sustainable OA publishing.

Last Words on OA Several misgivings about OA but it is still alive

and growing stronger.

OA ideals laudable especially for developing countries.

OA costs need to be built into research grants.

Institutions should set aside funds to support OA ‘author pays’ model for their staff, aside library’s budgets.

Last Words on OA Institutions should give OA articles more weight

as for subscription ones for advancement of their staff.

Institutions should set up transition fund for the development their OA publishing.

Governments should legislate that public funded research should be published in OA journals.

Stakeholders should fashion out a more sustainable OA publishing model.

Institutional Repositories Publicly accessible repository (archive)

where all the work published by researchers/authors affiliated with the university/institution can be posted online.

Contributes to the status of the institution by displaying the intellectual output of the institution.

Institutional Repositories “An institutional repository is a digital

archive of the intellectual product created by the faculty, research staff, and students of an institution and accessible to end users both within and outside of the institution, with few, if any, barriers to access.”

The case for institutional repositories: A SPARC position paper. Release 1.0, 2002. http://www.arl.org/sparc

Institutional Repositories

“University-based institutional repository is a set of services that a university offers to the members of its community for the management and dissemination of digital materials created by the institution and its community members”

-Clifford A. Lynch. Institutional repositories: Essential infrastructure for scholarship in the digital age. ARL Bi-monthly Report 226, February 2003.

http://www.arl.org/newsltr/226/ir.html

Institutional RepositoriesWhat does an IR do?

- Provides an interface for online submission of research publications of the institution - Provides online and open access to its content

as metadata only or full text publication.- Share metadata with other IRs

What is an IR system? - Hardware, software, content and the staff who managing it

Institutional RepositoriesWhat is an IR used for?

Long term organisation, preservation, access and distribution of research output of an institution.

Enhanced scholarly communication through inter-

operable open access IRs.

Improving the management of research knowledge.

Why Do we need IRs Born-digital research material keeps increasing

each day.

There are currently several types and formats of publications.

Portrays the institution’s intellectual output

Interest of Researchers to use digital publishing avenues.

Availability of various digital library technologies – metadata standards, interoperability protocols, preservation strategies, and repository software

Why We need IRs

The biggest challenges will be

- how are we going to support the archiving and dissemination of this avalanche of publications? - Who/what will be responsible for bringing all these materials together and make them accessible from a single source?

The IR does that

Who may set up an IR?

Any institution that is interested in improving the organisation, preservation, access and dissemination of its intellectual assets/output, but currently more emphasis is being placed on institutions of higher learning who produce a lot of scholarly communication.

Benefits to Institutions

Increases the institution’s visibility, status and public value in society.

Showcases the quality, scientific, social and economic relevance of the institution's research activities.

Improves the management of the institution’s research knowledge.

Benefits To Researchers… Provides assistance to faculty who seek

innovative means to give access to their research.

Ensures wider access, visibility and improved impact of their research results

A means for sharing unpublished ideas and know-how’s among peers globally.

Ensures quick communication and long-term preservation of research output.

Benefits to Researchers Complements and supplements publishing of their

articles in journals.

Encourages collaborative research.

Assists in attracting local and international research funding.

Provides global access to research literature.

Ensures easy access to faculty papers by students

Facilitate knowledge sharing and ‘re-use’

What may be put in an IR (Content)… Scholarly work: research/ teaching oriented that

is produced by an institution’s research community

Non-ephemeral: work in complete form, ready for dissemination

Perpetual license: author grants the right to the institution to preserve and distribute the work through the repository

Published material : Journal papers (post-prints), the text of journal articles accepted for publication book chapters, conference papers

What may be put in an IR (Content)… Unpublished/ gray material : Pre-prints of articles

or research reports submitted for publication , working papers, theses and dissertations, students projects, technical reports, progress/ status reports, committee reports, teaching materials etc.

Supporting material: Data sets from research projects, models, simulations

Works of art ; photographs and video recordings

Computer software

What may be put in an IR (Content)…

University records

An institutional repository may contain work of which copyright is owned by the author or university, or for which permission has been obtained to include a copy of the work in the repository.

A repository may also contain a copy of the formatted publication with the agreement of the publisher,

What cannot be put in an IR… A university repository should not contain

content that necessary copyright or licensing arrangements have not been made.

The greatest hindrances are -Academics like to publish in refereed journals. -Most of the Journals require authors to sign Copyright and Transfer Agreements. -Copyright Transfer Agreements prevents self- archiving in a number of ways.Solution?

What cannot be put in an IR

Solution is this: When authors want to publish an article it is important to:

Choose journals that have non-exclusive licences

Choose journals that have Self Archiving-friendly licenses About 75% of journals allow self archiving Only about 25% give no rights at all

It is important to negotiate with the publisher to amend the existing licence or use an alternative licence

Copyright issues of IR Copyright infringement is the key question

frequently asked by researchers when an IR is being introduced so it is important to address concerns that may be raised to settle the minds of academics and IR managers

Copyright is not infringed when pre-prints are self without seeking anyone else's permission because the author holds the copyright.

However for refereed post-print, the author must find out the copyright policies of the journal publisher.

Choosing an IR Software Important for the Library directors need to

balance the need for innovation in managing digital archives with available resources and budget constraints.

The choice of an Institutional Repository system depends on the specific needs of the institution.

It is important as a first step to check out existing IR initiatives to evaluate them for scope, quality and ease of use for the end user.

We did these and chose DSpace for KNUST IR.

IR Open Source Software (OSS) The major component of an IR is the repository

management software

There are currently several software available to the public under open source (free use)that are OAI metadata harvesting protocol compliant.

One can download the Open Source Software platform, for free and customise for use. Some of these software are DSpace, EPrints, Fedora, Greenstone, Evergreen .

Advantages of OSS They are for free Already fitted with OAI compliant facility. They have often been already tried by many

others. They already have a Community of use that will

provide active support. They track research and trends in information

management and Internet technology and so carries out revisions.

They are mostly made for submission of documents and review and also for archiving.

Consider the Uses The Institutional Repository software

needs to serve a variety of uses with a little customisation for: Pre-print and e-print archives Online theses (ETD) Educational materials Digital libraries materials delivery University records management (in the future) Alternative publishing platforms (in the future)

Components of an IR The important components of an institutional

repository should be:

An interface that allows for addition of content to the IR. An interface that enables searching/browsing/ and

retrieval of content. A database for storing the content. An administrative interface that supports collection

management and preservation activities. Some additional features that will allow integration with

other university systems like online courseware, etc.

Main features and Function of an IRMust allow for

Registration of institutional users (authors) – to allow document submission, setting up of profile,

authenticating users, etc

Document submission – that allows Authentication ,Assignment of Metadata,

Uploading documents, Granting licenses

Approval/ moderation – that allows Approval of Submission as related to format,

metadata, affiliation, etc and also the Content .

Main features and function of an IRMust Allow For

Archiving – To enable Date stamping, support for preservation, assignment of Unique/persistent identifier and Indexing and storage

Dissemination – To enable browsing, searching, registration and compliant to OAI and management of rights

Administration – To allow the administration of communities, collections, users, groups as well as document formats, metadata, – Licenses, submission policies and preservation

Accessing IR InformationThe Content of an IR can be accessed on internet through

OAISTER -www-oaister.org OpenDOAR –www.opendoar.org ARC – arc.cs.odu.edu/ Google –www.google.com

Implementation of the IR… Resource Needs– Infrastructure

• An IR server (P4, 512MB/1GB RAM, enough

storage, Linux OS) • Support for fault tolerant operation • Good Network bandwidth

– Human resources for• Installation and configuration of the IR• Management of Content, Promotion and

Advocacy of the IR • Administration and maintenance of the IR

Implementation of the IR… Management commitment and long term

funding support - For Processes

-Development of Policies to include: Types and formats of Documents to accept; Submission and approval policy & procedures; Rights management; Preservation policy; Author permissions/license terms;

–Development of metadata, cataloguing and quality standards

–Selection, installation and configuration of repository software system

Implementation of the IR… Other Processes – Compliance with Publishers’ copyright/ archive policy*

– Encouraging the participation of Faculty in submitting content and using the IR

- Addressing the concerns of Faculty about IPR, quality of IR, anticipated workload, undermining tried/tested practices

– Dissemination, providing service– Administration and maintenance

* see Project RoMEO (Rights MEtadata for Open archiving) http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/ls/disresearch/romeo/

index.html

Implementation of the IR… Costs - Starting is really low cost

• hardware ; software (repository software is free); installation; policies and procedures

- Medium-term costs may be higher • advocacy/marketing to secure content and support; mediated submission.

- Ongoing costs may be significant for • Creation / enhancement of metadata; preservation

Implementation of the IR Collaborators

Librarians

IT specialists

Faculty

Administration

Implementation of the IR Strategies for increasing content

- Initial efforts through Library staff harvesting from Publications hosted on faculty home pages ; archived in discipline archives; existing international repositories; open access journals; institution’s journal; journals permitting post-print archiving.

- Ongoing through

Self archiving by faculty/ researchers; Scanning e-journals and databases; and submission by library staff in compliance with archive policy of publishers; submission of only metadata if the full text archiving not possible

Main Challenges of an IR Attracting content to the repository

– Involves managing cultural change; marketing IR concept to researchers as to its usefulness, complementary & supplementary roles

Libraries can play proactive role

Managing quality of content/Peer review/ Type of content

Moderation/ Approval of content at Community level or what level?

IR relationship with open access journals?

Main Challenges of an IR Methods for Long term preservation

– issue of Bit preservation, format preservation

How to Manage digital rights - usage of ‘Creative Commons’ (www.creativecommons.org)

How to develop aggregated repository infrastructure – Based on inter-operable institutional repositories though Consortia, regional IR, national IR, discipline IR?

Conclusion Institutional Repositories are with us and are

proving very useful and strategic. Institutional repositories improve visibility and

impact of institutional intellectual output as well as those of researchers.

They greatly improve scholarship and scholarly communication through their interoperable facilities and enable collaborative research.

What is needed is its acceptance by researchers by submitting their works to populate it to make it content- rich and a first choice place for access to output of an institution.

Thank you

Any questions?

Related SourcesThe case for institutional repositories: A SPARC

position paper. Release 1.0, 2002.http://www.arl.org/sparc

• SPARC institutional repository checklist & resource guide. Release 1.0, November 2002.http://www.arl.org/sparc

• Open Society Institute. A guide to institutional repository software. 2nd Edition. January 2004.http://www.soros.org/openaccess/software

• Open Archives Initiative (OAI). http://www.openarchives.org/

Related SourcesClifford A. Lynch. Institutional repositories:

Essential infrastructure for scholarship in thedigital age. ARL Biomonthly Report 226, February 2003.http://www.arl.org/newsltr/226/ir.html

• Creative Commons. http://www.creativecommons.org/

• CNRI. Handle system. http://www.handle.net/ • Project RoMEO (Rights MEtadata for Open

archiving)http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/ls/disresearch/romeo/index.html