The present model policy aims to assist Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) in developing policies for Open Science/ Open Access.

The proposed policy aims at aligning institutional policies with the 2012 Recommendation of the European Commission on access to and preservation of scientific information and its 2018 update, the Regulation (EU) 2021/695 of the European Parliament and the Council establishing Horizon Europe- the framework programme for Research and Innovation, laying down its rules for participation and dissemination, the Council Decision (EU) 2021/764 establishing the specific programme implementing Horizon Europe the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, and takes into consideration important developments at EU-level related to Open Science/ Open Access such as the ERA Policy Agenda 2022-2024, the “Plan S” and “cOAlition S”, the developments of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) and in particular the EOSC Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda, the action lines of the European Open Science Policy Platform, the 2022 EU Regulation on European data governance, the 2023 EU Regulation on harmonised rules on fair access to and use of data, the European Strategy for Data and the 2019 EU Directive on open data and the re-use of public sector information, the Report “Towards a 2030 Vision on the Future of Universities in Europe”, the 2022 Agreement for Reforming Research Assessment (ARRA), and the European Commission’s Action Plan for implementing ARRA, the European Charter for Access to Research Infrastructures, the Principles of Open Scholarly Infrastructure (POSI), the Paris Call on Research Assessment prepared by the French Open Science Committee in 2022, and the Strategic Vision & OpenAIRE’s Role in empowering the CoARA Community published in December 2024. 

In addition, the document also takes into consideration other related reports and initiatives from university associations like EUA’s “Perspectives on the new European Research Area from the university sector” and “Universities without walls: A vision for 2030”, the Helsinki initiative on Multilingualism in Scholarly Communication, the Barcelona Declaration on Open Research Information, the Guild of European research intensive universities “Looking to the Future: the Guild’s Vision for Europe’s Universities” and other associations like the Science Europe practical guide to the “International Alignment of Research Data Management”. The considerations included in this document regarding personal data protection and research ethics are aligned with the European Code for Research Integrity, the Guideline for promoting research integrity in research performing organizations, and the “EU Grants — How to complete your ethics self-assessment”. Regarding the use of AI systems, the EU AI Act was taken into consideration as well as the guidance “Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI” and “Living Guidelines on the responsible use of AI in research”. The model policy has been prepared as part of a toolkit for policy makers on Open Science and Open Access in the context of the EU-funded OpenAIRE Advance project that supported Open Access/ Open Data mandates in Europe. The proposed policy draws heavily on the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science.

All the aforementioned considerations are built upon the foundational work laid out by earlier initiatives, including the MedOANet guidelines for Open Access, PASTEUR4OA Toolkit and Policy Guidelines, the RECODE project policy recommendations for Open Access policies to research data, the LEARN project Model Research Data Management Policy, and the SPARC Europe report on Open Data and Open Science policies in Europe.

DEFINITIONS

· AI system: A machine-based system designed to operate with varying levels of autonomy and adaptiveness. It processes inputs to generate outputs—such as predictions, content, recommendations, or decisions—that serve explicit or implicit objectives and can influence physical or virtual environments.

· Citizen Science: Τhe general public engagement in scientific research activities when citizens actively contribute to science either with their intellectual effort or surrounding knowledge or with their tools and resources.

· Diamond Open Access refers to the immediate open access of a publication by the journal or book publisher without payment of a fee.

· Gold Open Access: the process of achieving open access through publication in an open access journal (open access publishing).

· Green Open Access: the process of providing open access through an open access repository (also known as “self-archiving”).

· Machine-readable copy of a publication is a publication in a format that can be used and understood by a computer.

· Metadata are the descriptors used for describing, tracing, use and management of the deposited item (indicatively: title of publication, author(s), institutional affiliation, name of journal where the publication has been accepted).

· Open Educational Resources (OER) according to the OECD are “teaching, learning and research materials that make use of tools like open licenses that permit their free reuse, continuous improvement and repurposing by others for educational purposes”.

· Open Peer Review may refer to a scholarly review mechanism where both the identities of the reviewer and the author are known to one another during the review and publication process, or to systems where reviewer reports are published alongside the articles, or systems where not only “experts” can comment, or a variety of combinations of the above or other novel methods

· Personal data: any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person (‘data subject’); an identifiable natural person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of that natural person.

· Publication is defined as the peer-reviewed published (or under publication) work of researchers based in the institution.

· Research Data is the data (such as statistics, results of experiments, measurements, observations, interview recordings, images, etc.) used to validate the results presented in scientific publications or other data used during a project and described in the Data Management Plan.

· Research is defined as any creative and systematically performed work with the goal of furthering knowledge.

· Research Output is defined in the context of Horizon Europe as any results generated through research and innovation activities funded by the program. These outputs encompass a wide range of deliverables, including scientific publications (such as articles, books, and conference papers), datasets, software, patents, intellectual property, prototypes, technologies, and process innovations. Research outputs also include technical reports, policy briefs, and other contributions that inform public policy.

· Researcher is defined as any member of the research staff of [Name of RPO], of all levels and irrespective of their employment status including employees and doctoral students

· RPO Service: refers to a service utilized within the research process that adheres to Open Science principles. These services facilitate open access, transparency, and collaboration in research, and may include tools such as repositories, Data Management Plan (DMP) platforms, electronic notebooks, electronic catalogues, and Diamond Open Access (OA) journals, among others.

· Suitable Repository is one that meets quality standards, for example FAIR Principles, OpenAIRE compatibility, CoreTrust Seal.

The Model Policy on Open Science for Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) is composed by 10 topics which defines the policy adopted by the organisation.

This model available for download, can be adapted by a RPO, having only to complete the specific information about their activity.