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Supporting Open Science in Norway

Jens H Aasheim

OpenAIRE offers a wide range of services that already contribute to our Open Science efforts  

"OpenAIRE has a long and strong commitment to training and support for putting Open Science into practice"
by Jens H. Aasheim

The OpenAIRE team has the pleasure of speaking to Jens H. Aasheim, Senior Advisor at the Norwegian Centre for Research Data. Read his reflections on Open Science.

How does UNIT support Open Science in Norway?

First of all, as of 2022, we are now call Sikt. This is the result of a merger, with amongst others The Norwegian Centre for Research Data. Our new profile gives us a broader scope of services to support Open Science, and we support Norwegian research performing institutions with:

  • DMP tools.
  • Research data archives.
  • Publication repositories.
  • Openscience.no - a national website dedicated to OS information and services. This includes monitoring the growth of open access and also hosting the Open Science Toolbox. New FAIR services stemming from a recent report will also be published here.
  • Consortia agreements with publisher. Such as Publish and Read agreements with legacy publishers and agreements with Gold OA publishers, but also alternative agreements and models. Like Diamond OA models and coordinating membership models in Open Library of Humanities, SciPost and SCOAP3, as well as DOAJ and SherpaRoMEO.

When and why did you decide to join OpenAIRE and become a NOAD?

As the national OA coordinators for Norway, and the hosts of both the national CRIS (Cristin) and the national repository aggregator (Nora), we were asked to join OpenAIRE as a NOAD in 2014. Additionally, we also accepted taking over the role of Regional Coordinator for Region North. Similar to the roles we had in the FP7-project PASTEUR4OA, which was later integrated with OpenAIRE.

What do you think is missing in Norway to fully embrace Open Science? 

We are well on the way to the Norwegian Governments goal of full open access to research articles in 2024. When it comes to open data, we need to work more on awareness, training and implementation of how to share data using the FAIR principles. We need to update the current career assessment system. A system favouring indirect indicators, singular metrics and publications in high ranking journals. We need a system based more on direct assessment. A system that evaluates research and researchers, not the journals they are published in. And to enable this form of assessment we need open science, open data and open publications.

What are your top three priorities you will focus on in the next year? 

  • Continue to ensure growth in OA through consortia negotiations with publishers and encourage alternative models (Diamond OA).
  • Work with the findings of the recent FAIR research data report to facilitate services that will enable the practice of Open Science.
  • Help with training and support for researchers to make their research results FAI.

How do you think OpenAIRE will help you succeed?

OpenAIRE offers a wide range of services that already contribute to our Open Science efforts. Services like Zenodo, the OpenAIRE Research Graph and several others are all obvious examples. But in addition to these technical services, OpenAIRE has a long and strong commitment to training and support for putting Open Science into practice. Both for the individual researcher and research institutions, as well as "train the trainers". The Open Science training and support resources provided by OpenAIRE are also of great value.

There is a new collaboration between OpenAIRE and the Research Council of Norway (RCN). How did it start and why is it important?

We have a close collaboration with the RCN, a well-established exchange of data is just one example of this. For instance, the national CRIS collects and contains data linking research publications to RCN project funding. As the OpenAIRE NOAD, we saw untapped potential in making use of services like the OpenAIRE Monitor. Not only in terms of enriching the data both we and the RCN already have, but also taking advantage of OpenAIRE's ability to catch and identify research output linked to RCN funding that may have somehow slipped through undetected by other data sources. To reap the rewards of Open Science, FAIR data and an upgraded research assessment system we need to expand our analytical capabilities and improve our data quality. Crosschecking and enriching based on multiple trusted sources, like OpenAIRE, is an important part of that.

 Get in touch with our NOAD in Norway! 

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Jens H. Aasheim

European Open Science Infrastructure, for open scholarly and scientific communication
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