Brussels, 02 March 2018 WK 2453/2018 INIT LIMITE RECH WORKING PAPER This is a paper intended for a specific community of recipients. Handling and further distribution are under the sole responsibility of community members. WORKING DOCUMENT From: To: Subject: ERAC Secretariat ERAC (European Research Area and Innovation Committee) ERAC Plenary 15-16 March - agenda item 6 (Standing Information Point) In view of item 6 of the agenda of the ERAC plenary on 15 and 16 March, delegations will find attached the SIP Note concerning the Outcomes of the Mutual Learning Exercise on Open Science- Altmetrics and Rewards. WK 2453/2018 INIT LIMITE EN
ERAC - Standing Information Point Outcomes of the Mutual Learning Exercise on Open Science- Altmetrics and Rewards Context 37 th Plenary meeting Agenda Item 6 Plovdiv, 15-16 March 2018 In January 2017, a Mutual Learning Exercise (MLE) on Open Science was launched under the Horizon 2020 Policy Support Facility. The MLE brought together thirteen countries: Armenia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. The MLE addressed three topics, all key elements of the European Open Science Agenda: 1. The potential of altmetrics alternative (i.e. non-traditional) metrics that go beyond citations of articles to foster Open Science 2. Incentives and rewards for researchers to engage in Open Science activities 3. Guidelines for developing and implementing national policies for Open Science A panel of independent experts, chaired by professor Frank Miedema, was appointed to guide the MLE. The MLE ran between January 2017 and January 2018. Three Country visits took place, to Finland (Helsinki), Croatia (Dubrovnik) and Switzerland (Zurich). At the end of each meeting, a thematic report was produced gathering the main reflections and learnings from participants. The final report will be published mid-march. It will gather lessons learned to suggest an indicative roadmap and (seven) stages to guide the implementation of open science. As regards altmetrics, the report will provide an analysis of the pros and cons of altmetrics, while also highlighting the importance of making both alternative and conventional metrics more open. All types of metrics require a broad discussion on "what matters" i.e. what kinds of research qualities and societal impacts or benefits we would like to see. Experimentation with altmetrics should be encouraged and experiences should be exchanged. The MLE also exposed the necessity of developing incentives for different stakeholders: for researchers, research organisations and funders, and last but not least for national governments and policy makers. Furthermore, research organisations and funders need to be rewarded for implementing Open Science, whereas policy makers need to understand the positive impact of Open Science on society at large, and on economy. 1
The four thematic reports and the final report are or will be available on the MLE page of the PSF Knowledge Centre. The outcome of the MLE will be widely disseminated through a number of activities: informing relevant working groups, committees, and initiatives with information briefs and short presentations (ERAC working groups, Open Science Policy Platform, ) planning a dedicated public event for the wider Open Science community. Discussions are ongoing to merge efforts with the Belgian Open Science event in November 2018 taking place at the Palace of the Academies. proposing regional or national presentations and workshops presenting at relevant events such as the ERA Stakeholder Forum or OS related conferences Participants also expressed strong interest in launching a number of follow-up activities to this MLE: A dedicated MLE on open infrastructures (such as the European Open Science Cloud) and open research data policies to discuss the co-design of national use cases, cost estimations, governance models, change management and so forth. The establishment of an expert group / working group on Open Leadership based on the outcomes of this MLE but also of the expert working groups on skills and rewards to address better the need of role models, pioneers, and pilot activities and scenarios. A review meeting after one year, not to loose momentum and to communicate and reflect achievements, hinderances and progress made after one year. 2
ANNEX THE EXPERT PANEL Frank Miedema- Chair (The Netherlands) Frank Miedema is Dean and Vice-President of the Executive Board of UMC UTRECHT. He studied biochemistry at the University of Groningen, specialising in immunology. As Divisional Manager at the Central Laboratory of the Blood Transfusion Service (CLB) he was responsible for such things as education and research, before going on to become Director of Sanquin Research. Miedema was affiliated with the University of Amsterdam as professor of Immunology of AIDS. In 2004 he became head of the Immunology Department at UMC Utrecht. Miedema is a member of various national and international scientific organisations and advisory committees. He has published hundreds of articles in medical journals, including Nature, Science and Lancet, and is one of the initiators of http://www.scienceintransition.com/. The initiators of Science in Transition believe that the scientific system is in need of fundamental reform. Science should be appreciated for the added value it contributes to society and stakeholders in society must participate in decisions regarding the production of knowledge. Katja Mayer- Rapporteur (Austria) Katja Mayer was trained as a sociologist and works at the intersection of science-technology-society. She studies the interactions of social scientific method and its publics. Right now she studies open practices in Computational Social Science and Big Data as PostDoc at the School of Governance, Technical University Munich, works as a senior scientist at the Center for Social Innovation in Vienna, and is associated researcher at the platform Responsible Research and Innovation in Academic Practice at the University of Vienna. Furthermore, she has been teaching sociology of knowledge and STS at the University of Vienna, Danube University, Krems, University of Art and Design Linz, University of Luzern among others and was visiting fellow at the Carnegie Mellon University s School of Computer Science. She is an active member of the Open Knowledge Foundation's workgroup on Open Science and participates in the OANA (Open Access Network Austria) working group on defining a national strategy for the transition to open access publishing. In 2011-2013, she was working as scientific advisor to the president of the European Research Council (ERC). 3
Kim Holmberg - Expert (Finland) Kim Holmberg is a senior researcher at the Research Unit for the Sociology of Education (RUSE) at the University of Turku, Finland. At RUSE, Dr. Holmberg works on questions related to scholarly communication, altmetrics, bibliometrics, informetrics, Open Science and social media. Recently he was the principal investigator of a project titled Measuring the Societal Impact of Open Science which was financed by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture s Open Science and Research Initiative (2015-2017). The project focused on investigating the meaning, validity and applicability of altmetrics. Holmberg is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Statistical Cybermetrics Research Group at the University of Wolverhampton, UK, and he holds the Title of Docent in Informetrics at Åbo Akademi University, Finland. His academic background includes periods as a postdoc researcher at the University of Wolverhampton, UK, and at the VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In 2015 he published a book about altmetrics, Altmetrics for Information Professionals Past, Present and Future (Chandos Publishing). Sabina Leonelli- Expert (UK/Italy) Sabina Leonelli is Professor of Philosophy and History of Science at the University of Exeter and Co-Director of the Exeter Centre for the Study of the Life Sciences, where she leads the Data Studies research strand. Her research focuses on the philosophy, history and sociology of data-intensive science, especially the research processes, scientific outputs and social embedding of Open Science and Open Data; scientific governance, ethics and research management in the age of artificial intelligence; and the role of non-human organisms in biological research and experimental practice. Her work has been supported by several funding bodies including the European Research Council, the Australian Research Council, the British Academy and the UK Economic and Social Research Council. She has published widely in philosophy, biology and social studies of science, including recently the book "Data-Centric Biology: a Philosophical Study" with Chicago University Press and the report "Biomedical Knowledge Production in the Age of Big Data" for the Swiss Science and Innovation Council. She is a member of the Open Science Policy Platform of the European Commission, in which she represents the Global Young Academy and chaired the working group on Open Access Publishing, and serves in the boards of multiple learned societies. 4