Supporting Open Research

The role of an academic library

#SciData17 · Wednesday 25 October 2017

Jez Cope, Research Data Manager
University of Sheffield Library

@jezcope · erambler.co.uk · github.com/jezcope

Overview

What is a modern research library?

Why are we involved with Open Research?

What can we do for you?

A reminder

Submit questions at slido.com/scidata17

These slides at jcope.shef.ac.uk/talks

doi:10.15131/shef.data.5537269

About me

Not a real librarian

Shh, don't tell anyone!

"Why do we still need libraries?"

"I mean, I can get everything online for free now…"

A library is more than a building full of books

What do librarians do?

“Librarians consider free access to information the foundation of democracy.”
— Marilyn Johnson (2011), This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All

Traditional librarianship expertise

Discoverability

Metadata

Information management systems

Preservation

Copyright/licensing

Information literacy

Policy

Teaching

So what?

Librarians manage information

Librarians facilitate access to information

Research is information…

Aha…

What can your librarian do for you?

Library Strategic Plan

At the University of Sheffield

Theme 2 (of 6): "Research Excellence & Impact"

Highlights

"…cohesive offering of library research services…"

"…new models of scholarly communication…"

"…secure digital assets for the future…"

The "Holy Trinity"

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FAIR data

Findable

Accessible

Interoperable

Reusable

(of course…)

Discoverability

Help make your content easier to find

…and therefore more likely to have an impact

Measure that impact with traditional & alternative metrics

F · A · I · R

Metadata

Help make your content…

articles, books, data, software, whatever

…easier to navigate and understand

F · A · I · R

Information management systems

Ways of storing your content to maintain your sanity

That includes both digital and physical systems

F · A · I · R

Preservation

Keep your content available over decades and centuries

F · A · I · R

Information literacy

Evaluate the quality of information sources

F · A · I · R

Policy

Stand up for the needs of our users

F · A · I · R

Open access to publications

Article Processing Charges (for paid/gold OA)

Institutional repository (for self-archiving/green OA)

Open data

Data repository

Data management plans

Open research generally

Writing guidance

Teaching (and developing teaching materials)

Planning

Managing projects

Community building

Infrastructure building

Policy development

Service evaluation

Collaborations

Within the Library

IT service

Research office

Research software engineering

Research ethics

Faculties, departments & institutes

Collaboration example: research software engineering

RSE

  • Code quality
  • Testing
  • Reproducibility
  • Data science

Library

  • Data/information management
  • Copyright/licensing
  • Metadata
  • Preservation

Together

Training · Policy · Lobbying

New directions

Data visualisation

Data librarians

Hybrid librarian & data scientist

Often embedded in research departments

(More common in the US)

Library Carpentry

Data skills for all librarians!

New scholarly communications

Data journals

Short-form monographs

Student journals

Altmetrics

What can you do for your librarian?

Ask questions

Invite them to contribute

Let them know what you need

Tell people how much you still get from the library

Oh, and please submit your reading lists on time… 😉

Acknowledgements

Research Support Unit, University Library

CICS, Research Services, RSE at Sheffield

Everyone whose ideas you've just seen!

Questions?

Thanks for listening!

Questions?