The 2019 International Open Access Week will be held October 21-27, 2019. This year’s theme, “Open for Whom? Equity in Open Knowledge,” builds on the groundwork laid during last year’s focus of “Designing Equitable Foundations for Open Knowledge.”
According to the 2019 Open Access Week Advisory Committee, “As the transition to a system for sharing knowledge that is open by default accelerates, the question ‘open for whom?’ is essential – both to consider and to act upon. Whose interests are being prioritized in the actions we take and in the platforms we support? Whose voices are excluded? Are underrepresented groups included as full partners from the beginning? Are we supporting not only open access but also equitable participation in research communication? These questions will determine the extent to which emerging open systems for research will address inequities in the current system or replicate and reinforce them.”
ACRL has a number of resources, publications, and events to help you prepare for, and participate in, Open Access Week.
Free Webcast on Tuesday, October 22!
ACRL is excited to offer a free webcast celebrating Open Access Week. Join us on Tuesday, October 22, at 1:00 pm CT, for “Open for Students and Educators: Open Educational Resources Level the Playing Field,” presented by Sara Rachel Benson, Copyright Librarian and Assistant Professor in the Scholarly Communication and Publishing Unit at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Open Educational Resources (OER) are not usually a hard sell for students. But what about educators? How do they benefit from having access to resources that are licensed openly, and how can we, as librarians, guide faculty in adopting and adapting OER?
Register for this free webcast today!
Scholarly Communication Toolkit
Developed and maintained by the ACRL Research and Scholarly Environment Committee (ReSEC), the Scholarly Communication Toolkit provides users with a basic understanding of scholarly communication issues in the context of their impact on libraries and offers resources and tools to support librarians as they navigate and transform the scholarly communication landscape. Users can also contribute their own tools or resources to the toolkit, including papers, presentations, handouts, videos, and more.
The Toolkit is freely available online and licensed through Creative Commons.
Bring Training to Your Campus
Take your learning to the next level with local, in-person training. ACRL’s RoadShow workshops open the door for academic and research libraries worldwide to bring high quality professional development directly to their campus, chapter, or consortium at an affordable cost. These interactive day-long workshops are led by experts in the field and cover a wide range of topics, including Scholarly Communication, Research Data Management, and more.
Learn more about bringing a RoadShow to your campus and how these workshops can help your library tackle the greatest issues facing the profession today.
Catch Up on Your Reading
Looking for a good book? Explore some of ACRL’s open access publications, including Applying Library Values to Emerging Technology: Decision-Making in the Age of Open Access, Maker Spaces, and the Ever-Changing Library; Open and Equitable Scholarly Communications: Creating a More Inclusive Future; and Undergraduate Research and the Academic Librarian: Case Studies and Best Practices.
Want to dive deeper into scholarly communication issues? Check out a selection of recent ACRL publications available through the ALA Store, including Scholarship in the Sandbox: Academic Libraries as Laboratories, Forums, and Archives for Student Work, and Institutional Repositories: CLIPP #44.
And make sure to stay up-to-date with ACRL’s open access College & Research Libraries, C&RL News, and RBM.
Look out for more information and resources from ACRL during Open Access Week itself. For more information, visit acrl.org or contact ACRL Program Officer Chase Ollis at collis@ala.org.