How does the University Library and HVV work with Open Access?
At MDU, we encourage researchers to publish in OA as much as possible. When looking at MDU, the School of Health, Care and Social Welfare (HVV) is the School that publishes most in OA. Why is this? The University Library has interviewed Maria Harder, Head of Research at HVV to learn more.
Maria Harder, Head of Research at HVV
HVV has increased its Open Access publication share by 28% since 2018. In 2022, 92% of their publications were Open Access.
Why are you so good at OA at HVV?
Because we get a lot of great help from the University Library to sound things out and find the best solution.
Have you made a particular investment in OA publishing?
No, but this is often expected from the research funding bodies.
What are the advantages of publishing OA?
To promote OA to research in countries where access to research is not as easy as it is here in Sweden, and it’s also a way of publishing that increases the number of citations.
Gunilla Sundström, Library Director
Many of the employees working at the University Library work with research and OA. We have interviewed Gunilla Sundström, Library Director.
How does the University Library work with OA?
The University Library works actively to promote the transition to OA by signing agreements with publishers where MDU research and the open publication of articles are included in the agreement. We support MDU’s researchers by coordinating the DAU (Data Access Unit) that supports researchers in their processing of research data with the aim of making their research data available after the research project has been completed and that research data during the research project is managed in a correct way. The University Library participates in national and international contexts to promote the transition to open science.
What is the OA Fund that the University Library is responsible for?
The University Library manages an OA fund for the researchers' OA publishing that is not included in agreements that have already been signed. This may apply to both journal articles and chapters from ebooks that are openly accessible.
What changes in OA publishing have you seen during your years as director of different university libraries?
Since the 1980s, much has happened when it comes to making scholarly information available within the university libraries. At that time, libraries bought access to the information through subscriptions to paper journals and the purchase of printed books, which were then made available by the library. Students and researchers had to visit the library to access research results and information. (The Library owned the information).
Subsequently, during the latter part of the 1990s and until about 2015, the digitisation of scholarly journals took place. The library still bought the scholarly information, which was then conveyed via the Internet and computers to the University's end users (the library became an intermediary). Thereafter, the University’s researchers and students didn’t need to physically go to the Library’s premises.
Since about 2015, a transformation has been taking place with the aim that the Library, instead of paying for reading rights, pays through licenses and agreements with publishers and journals for researchers' scholarly publications in the journals, which are thereby made completely openly accessible to everyone (the Library becomes part of the research publication). Everyone can access the research findings, which will be freely available, and the user no longer needs to be tied to a specific university.
Thus far, a hybrid solution is in place where the Library/University pays partly for reading rights and partly for open research publishing. The goal of the Swedish government and the EU is that the transition to complete open access to scholarly publishing will be completed by 2026.
Contact
Would you like to know more? Get in touch with the Library’s research service at biblioteket.forskarservice@mdu.se