PARD Working Group Report
The final report is now available for download. Our recommendations are excerpted below.
Develop Partnerships
Awareness of open research practices can be enhanced by the development of key partnerships. OVCR should partner with the IUPUI Open Scholarship Community and IUPUI University Library to enhance IUPUI researchers’ participation in data sharing and other open research practices. In particular, IUPUI University Library is currently developing a Research Information Management Librarian position that would be a key point of contact and collaboration for OVCR within the Library.
We also recommend that existing school and/or departmental level open research initiatives be identified and supported. This can also inform the cultivation of champions described in the next set of recommendations.
Communicate Value
One thing that is exceedingly clear from our work is the disciplinary differences in research and data sharing practices. We believe researchers will find it useful to hear from their disciplinary colleagues and therefore recommend the continued development of champions and success stories among IUPUI faculty. Existing communication channels can be used to highlight open research success stories and celebrate champions. It would also be useful to install champions on relevant groups to continue advocating for open research policies and practices on campus. These champions, including IUPUI University Library representatives, can also be regular guests at the IUPUI Faculty Council Research Affairs Committee and the OVCR-convened Council of Associate Deans for Research to share information regarding data sharing policies and benefits.
Identify and Leverage Incentives
The question of what incentivizes researchers to engage in data sharing is a common one in this space. The Working Group recommends the following incentives and encourages the identification and leverage of additional incentives. Much work is currently underway regarding incentives for open research practices. Most notable is the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) Roundtable on Aligning Incentives for Open Science. The Roundtable has issued a publication titled Developing a Toolkit for Fostering Open Science Practices that offers valuable guidance that could be applied at IUPUI.
For some researchers, the primary incentive for data sharing is compliance. Journals are increasingly requiring data sharing as part of the publication process. IUPUI-based journals should be encouraged to institute such policies if they do not already exist. We also recommend that internal grants require a data management and sharing plan where applicable. The University of North Carolina Greensboro was piloting such a requirement when we spoke with them in 2021 and may be able to offer sound advice on developing and implementing such a requirement.
Another potentially powerful incentive is recognition and rewards. We recommend the development of graduate student and faculty awards to recognize open data sharing as a first step in rewarding open research. The most powerful reform in this arena would be the full integration and valuing of open practices and the sharing of all research artifacts (i.e., protocols, data, preprints) in promotion and tenure standards, and OVCR advocating for such a reform would be a powerful statement.