The Scholarly Communications Team at Edinburgh University Library have just submitted their end-of-year-one report to RCUK. This details how “compliant” we think we are with RCUK’s Open Access policy. We know that we have far to go, and that there is still much to do, but our current Open Access rates for RCUK-funded journal articles and conference proceedings is running at 64%. There *are* a number of caveats to that figure, but having looked at a range of data samples and reports we feel that it is a representative figure that we are happy to stand by.
So, that puts us ahead of the year 1 target of a minimum of 45% compliance, but there is much more to do over the course of year 2! Firstly, we need to see this rate increase further, and we need to ensure that all the details of the policy are being adhered to in every single case – (compliance with data requirements, correct acknowledgement of funder, correct CC-BY licence etc). Perhaps our biggest challenge over the next year is learning from our relative success here and stepping it up to cover ALL journal articles and conference proceedings in anticipation of the new requirements for REF. This is going to be a major challenge, but one we are ready to get stuck in to!
Well done to the Scholarly Communications Team and all the Publications Assistants who have helped contribute to this success. Our full report is available at https://www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/9386.
Dominic Tate, University of Edinburgh
Be First to Comment