International Open Access Week runs from October 23–29, 2017. For all of the details, visit www.openaccessweek.org.
This year’s theme is “Open in order to:” with a blank line to highlight what open access enables your library or institution to do.
Open in order to:
Your library or institution is probably utilizing open access resources. For Open Access Week this year, promote them to show how they can benefit your users. Here are just a few of the ways.
Promote Institutional Repositories
Many institutions are publishing open access resources in institutional repositories, often administered by library staff. Whether using paid proprietary platforms such as bepress’s Digital Commons or open source products CONTENTdm, DSpace, and Omeka, institutions can publish open access scholarly articles, journals, books, and data.
Does your institution have an institutional repository? If so, promote it to your users—both creators and consumers. Show faculty and staff how they can extend the reach of their published research and increase citation counts. Teach users to find relevant open access resources written by their own professors and others in their field.
Also, help scholars extend their reach by helping them register for an ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID), a unique 16-digit number which distinguishes them from other researchers in online resources.
Extend Electronic Resources Budgets
We all subscribe to must-have research databases. But as subscription prices rise and library budgets are stretched thin, supplementing your list of paid databases with free, open access databases and journals makes sense. Important scholarly works are now being published exclusively in major open access databases such as arXiv, HathiTrust Digital Library, and PLOS ONE.
Increasingly, traditional publishers and database vendors are joining the trend of open access and providing some free content. Even if you don’t subscribe to their paid content, you can link to open access from publishers and databases.
Offer Free Textbooks and Other Educational Resources
Along with higher journal and database costs, students and libraries are faced with increasing costs of textbooks. Librarians have led the push towards expanding the use of open educational resources (OER). Encourage your faculty and staff to use open access textbooks when possible.
Learn More
Visit the Official Site
Visit the official Open Access Week website to see 2017 events and read their blogs to learn about what others are doing. Download resources & media such as posters, handouts, stickers, and logos to promote the event.
Follow on Social Media
Follow and use the Twitter hashtags #OAWeek and #OpenInOrderTo.
Past Open Access Weeks
Get more ideas from our previous Open Access Week 2016 and Open Access Week 2015 articles.