Education 2.0 & 3.0

Tecmilenio once again takes the lead in educational innovation by launching the Center for the Development of Competencies (CDC).

Via Peter Mellow

Conference on Learning Information Literacy across the Globe
https://informationliteracy.eu/conference/
10.5.2019 Frankfurt am Main
#LILG_2019 #biblioVerifica #crowdSearcher #iloOER

The slides describes the BiblioVerifica blog, which is an attempt by librarians to fight misinformation by using media and data literacy, engaging citizens as awareness users of the social networks, chats and blogs.
Biblioverifica aims to be a public engagement project based on information literacy practices, implementing tips and tricks about search tools, reliable sources, verification strategies. This non-profit initiative promotes fact-checking based on open resources as data, journals, tools, etc.
contact
https://economia.uniroma2.it/biblioteca/lilg_2019/

Via Elizabeth E Charles

A while ago I asked if any writers wanted guidance on finding free – and most importantly, legal – access to academic research online. About 190+ respondents said yes. So belatedly, here’s some advice on finding research without paying for it.

Writers need access to academic research for lots and lots of reasons. When I started working on Empire of Sand I wanted to use India’s Mughal Empire for inspiration, which meant I specifically needed to research the history, culture and politics of that era and region of the world.

Via Elizabeth E Charles

In this post Richard Fisher argues that "polemical articles by Open Access enthusiasts claiming to know ‘what researchers want’ (when in reality what they mean is ‘what I and my immediate peer groups would find most helpful’) can be profoundly off-putting to those outside the circle of advocacy." There's a presumption of "universal acceptance of the principles behind Open Access" which leads him to "wonder which planet these agencies are inhabiting." Some examples: in STEM, research is used to create other products and services, which ultimately pay for the research, but in non-STEM fields the research output is the product. Moreover, "the presumption that ‘the law’ is, fundamentally, that law which applies to the state of California" is clearly mistaken." Even the "‘taxpayer pays’ arguments for Open Access" is weak, he argues, especially in research-exporting jurisdictions like the UK "where at least 80% of the consumers of British-originated research will not have contributed direct tax revenues towards its creation." There are some interesting points here.

Via Miloš Bajčetić

I don’t know how common it is for folks to have to explain Creative Commons licenses for others, but it often feels like a “continuously negotiated” thing (to use Catherine Cronin’s term). So I recently had a conversation that went something like this, with a professor who wants to create an open textbook (the actual discussion was slightly more complex and with more people involved):

Via Elizabeth E Charles

There are so many useful skills you’ll develop while doing your research – from critical thinking and being able to evaluate your work and that of others, to time management skills. But the research world is rapidly changing, so what skills can you develop now to make you ready for the research future? In this post we guide you through some of the key skills for researchers today.

Via Elizabeth E Charles

Libraries and funding agencies are finally flexing their muscles against journal paywalls. Authors should follow suit.

 

A PERSON COULD BE FORGIVEN for believing 20 years ago that the internet would soon revolutionize academic publishing. With the emergence of the world wide web, it suddenly became possible for academic publishers to disseminate scholarly work at the click of a button — at a fraction of the cost of printing and mailing hard-copy journals. Recognizing the opportunity, many scholars and librarians began to advocate a new, open access model of academic publishing, in which research articles are made freely available online to anyone who wants them, not just affiliates of colleges or universities. The result would be a true online “public library of science” — which, as it so happens, also became the name of one of the first publishers to embrace the model.

As a new librarian in the early 2000s, I believed passionately in the cause of open access and worked hard to bring it about. But almost two decades later, the movement has made only slight gains at the margins, and the traditional subscription-based model remains firmly entrenched in academia. For the university libraries who bear most of the subscription costs, it is as though the internet revolution never happened: Since 1986, research library expenditures have grown at more than four times the rate of inflation, with journal prices showing the greatest price jumps of all.

Via Elizabeth E Charles

Introduction. Open access to digital research output is increasing, but academic library policies can place restrictions on public access to libraries. This paper reports on a preliminary study to investigate the correlation between academic library access policies and institutional positions of openness to knowledge.
Method. This primarily qualitative study used document and data analysis to examine the content of library access or use policies of twelve academic institutions in eight countries. The outcomes were statistically correlated with institutional open access publication policies and practices.
Analysis. We used an automated search tool together with manual searching to retrieve Web-based library access policies, then categorised and counted the levels and conditions of public access. We compared scores for institutional library access feature with open access features and percentages of open access publications.
Results. Academic library policies may suggest open public access but multi-layered user categories, privileges and fees charged can inhibit such access, with disparities in openness emerging between library policies and institutional open access policies.
Conclusion. As open access publishing options and mandates expand, physical entry and access to print and electronic resources in academic libraries is contracting. This conflicts with global library and information commitments to open access to knowledge.

Via Elizabeth E Charles

The Publishing Trap is a board game from the UK Copyright Literacy team that allows participants to explore the impact of scholarly communications choices and discuss the role of open access in research by following the lives of four researchers – from doctoral research to their academic legacies. It is a full functioning, prototype game first developed in 2016 when it won a runner’s up prize at the LILAC Lagadothon. However, the game has evolved considerably since then.

Via Elizabeth E Charles