Sep 28, 2022
The event focused on issues of open science (OS) and open access (OA), with particular insight into the existing national and regional initiatives, as well as the practice of OS/OA in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the region.
Date: 22.09.2022
Location: Faculty of Political Science, University of Banja Luka
Organisers: University of Banja Luka
Format: hybrid – on site and online
Who attended the event?
The event gathered 55 participants (33 on site, 22 online) from the Western Balkans region and beyond.
What happened at the event?
After a brief welcome by the Vice-Rector at the University of Banja Luka, Miroslav Malinović, he indicated that the University of Banja Luka was among the first public universities in Bosnia and Herzegovina that included the principles of open science and open access in its focus. Presentations followed the agenda and below we highlight some key points addressed:
Regional (WB) outlook on Open Science and Open Access
Regional initiatives for open science and open access in the Western Balkans, Monika Petrova, RCC
- Open science models – a challenge for researchers and research organizations not only from the Western Balkans but also from in the most parts of the EU
- Sharing of research output including knowledge, data, and tools as early as possible in the Research and Innovation process
- Open research infrastructures are critically important to make scientific knowledge available in a long run
- The RCC has been supporting the Western Balkans to follow Open Science developments at the EU level
- Open Access policies are essential part of well functioning research infrastructures yet scattered implementation or limited development
- Developing the Open Science practices in the higher education and public research organizations in the region is still a work in progress
National Initiatives for Open Science in Europe / EOSC, Mihajlo Savić, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, University of Banja Luka
- University of Banja Luka is a member of EOSC and a part of OpenAIRE (NOAD)
- EOSC will provide 1.7M EU researchers an environment with free, open services for data storage, management, analysis and re-use across disciplines.
- EOSC will join existing and emerging horizontal and thematic data infrastructures, bridging today fragmentation and ad-hoc solutions.
- EOSC is a platform for European research and a virtual space where science producers and consumers come together
Open access and Open science legislatives and repositories, Snežana Smederevac, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad
- Presenting the results of the analysis of open science practices in the Western Balkans region, made within the WBC-RRI.NET project
- Analysis showed that there has been some positive policy initiatives and open science practices in countries of the region, but that there is still much room for improvements
OS/OA in practice: Data Archive for Social Sciences in BiH, Amela Kurta, CREDI – DASS BiH
- Demonstrating what open science and open access look like in practice
- DASS BiH (Data Archive for Social Sciences in Bosnia and Herzegovina) is the national service whose role is to ensure long term preservation and dissemination of social science research data
- Over 50 datasets available for usage, including data about BiH citizens, but also from other Western Balkans countries
- Provides data under the FAIR principles
- The purpose of the data archive is to provide a vital research data resource for researchers, teachers, students, and all other interested users.
International outlook on Open Science and Open Access
cOAlition S and Plan S, Johan Rooryck, cOAlition S
- cOAlition S includes 28 organizations worldwide
- Plan S is a set of 10 principles, including guidance on implementation, and cOAlition S Funders have agreed to implement those principles
- Plan S is to be regarded as a tool towards reaching the goals of open science
- cOAlition S brings together institutions and organizations that finance research and strives to provide open access to research publications
The Slovenian experience with plan S, Miro Pušnik, ARRS, Slovenian member of cOAlition S
- Presenting the experience of Slovenia as a part of cOAlition S
- Some of the key reasons for Slovenia to join cOAlition S were:
- involvement and contact with good practices in this field
- better starting point for negotiations with publishers
- incentive for the development of national open science policies
Thereafter, representatives of cOAlition S had the opportunity to participate in a discussion planned after the presentation, and to share experiences on open access with representatives of regional organizations that fund research and innovation.
The event was followed by the meetings of working groups within the project, which are focused on gender equality and ethical issues in research (WG1), as well as on open science and open access (WG3). The meetings ended with a cross-WG discussion focusing on Ethics of OS/OA.
The recording of the event is available on our YouTube channel.
This article was prepared by Milica Maric (UNIBL) and Andjela Pepic (UNIBL).