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Topic: Discovery and access

Blog Post
March 6, 2023

The Future of Data Sharing in the Humanities

As the National Endowment for the Humanities updates its policies in response to last year’s announcement of new federal guidelines issued by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) regarding public access to research publications and data, humanists will face urgent questions about how their scholarly practices within the global trends towards mandatory data sharing. When should the evidence humanists collect be considered data, and when is it appropriate to share those data? How might humanists…
Blog Post
January 26, 2023

Teaching with Streaming Video

A New Report from Ithaka S+R Provides Insights from Instructors

Instructors from all disciplines have incorporated video into their syllabi, and—unsurprisingly—streaming video is now the dominant format to which they turn. Faculty and students appreciate the flexibility of streaming video, which students can access on a variety of platforms ranging from YouTube to subscription services licensed by university libraries. Libraries are now making significant investments to license streaming content for educational use and anticipate that their spending in this area will double over the next five years. As the…
Past Event
November 15, 2022

Best Practices, Challenges, and Solutions for Virtual Conferencing

Keystone Symposia Reimagining Scientific Conferences

On Tuesday, November 15, Ithaka S+R’s Dylan Ruediger will participate in a panel discussion on Best Practices, Challenges, and Solutions for Virtual Conferencing, hosted by Keystone Symposia as part of Reimagining Scientific Conferences. The virtual event will explore lessons learned from the pandemic in how to engage audiences online, the benefits of virtual formats, and the challenges of replicating networking opportunities and catalyzing collaborations. Learn more about the event and register here.
Past Event
October 27, 2022

Perspectives on the Nelson Memo

Mandating Public Access to the Outputs of Federally-Funded Research in the US

On Thursday, October 27 at 11:00am – 12:30pm ET, the Council of Science Editors is hosting a webinar that will bring together experts in scholarly publishing to discuss the possible implications of the Nelson Memo for publishers, authors, and the scientific community more broadly. The panel will be moderated by Brooke LaFlamme, with speakers Jennifer Griffiths, James Butcher, Angela Cochran, and Ithaka S+R’s Dylan Ruediger. Learn more and register here.
Past Event
October 20, 2022

Streaming Video in the Classroom: Connecting Acquisitions and Instruction

2022 Annual Video Trust Conference Session

In a virtual session at the 2022 Annual Video Trust Conference, taking place on October 17 – 20th, Dylan Ruediger and Makala Skinner will share updates from an Ithaka S+R project studying the evolving landscape of streaming educational video. The session will share data from a survey released in June and present a preview of the next phase of the project, which will involve semi-structured interviews with over 200 instructors about their experiences teaching with video. The event takes place…
Blog Post
August 9, 2022

Sustaining Scientific Data Sharing Communities

Findings from an Incubation Workshop

The sharing of research data is essential to open science, and major funders have made significant investments in building an infrastructure of domain and generalist data repositories to support data sharing. While barriers to data sharing remain a challenge, many communities of researchers actively and voluntarily share and reuse data to advance science in areas of mutual interest. Understanding the successes and challenges these “data communities” face is important to providing support for their evolving needs as they grow, and…
Blog Post
July 14, 2022

Tracking the Research, Teaching, and Publishing Practices of Faculty Members Nationally

US Faculty Survey

We are excited to announce the publication of the US Faculty Survey 2021. Through this national survey, we have been able to track the changing research, teaching, and publishing practices of faculty members within higher education triennially since early digital transformation at the turn of the century. Against the backdrop of the global pandemic and its numerous impacts on many different facets of higher education, this eighth cycle of the survey illuminates how earlier research and instructional trends…
Research Report
June 9, 2022

Streaming Media Licensing and Purchasing Practices at Academic Libraries

Survey Results

Researchers have undertaken several important efforts to track how libraries are approaching the streaming media market and troubleshoot the challenges they are encountering, focusing especially on strategies for balancing patron demand with managing costs. Building on those data gathering efforts, this report shares findings from the most comprehensive survey to date of academic library streaming media approaches at four-year institutions in the US and Canada.
Blog Post
January 18, 2022

Ithaka S+R is Growing: Join Us!

Over the past few years, the scope and breadth of Ithaka S+R’s work has grown substantially. The Libraries, Scholarly Communication, and Museums program has seen increases in cohort projects that explore critical issues facing libraries; grant funded initiatives focused on digital preservation, higher education in prison, student success, and museum leadership; national surveys of faculty, community college administrators, and archivists; and sponsored work on topics including the health of the research enterprise and diversifying collections.  To…
Blog Post
January 12, 2022

Preprints: Their Evolving Role in Science Communication

New Publication

We are pleased to announce the publication of Preprints: Their Evolving Role in Science Communication by Iratxe Puebla and Jessica Polka, both of ASAPbio, and Ithaka S+R’s Oya Y. Rieger. It is part of the Charleston Briefings: Trending Topics for Information Professionals series. This briefing discusses the history and role of preprints—scholarly manuscripts posted by the author(s) to a repository or platform to facilitate open and broad sharing of early work without any limitations…
Past Event
December 2, 2021

Book Talk: Along Came Google

Deanna Marcum and Roger C. Schonfeld in conversation with Brewster Kahle

On December 2 at 4:00 pm (EST), the Internet Archive is hosting a virtual book talk with Deanna Marcum and Roger C. Schonfeld about their new book, Along Came Google: A History of Library Digitization. Deanna and Roger will be joined in conversation by Brewster Kahle, the founder and digital librarian of the Internet Archive, as they discuss the history of library digitization projects and what these efforts hold for future scholars. The conversation will be followed by a Q&A.
Past Event
October 20, 2021

Oya Y. Rieger at iPRES2021

On October 20, Rieger will join other panelists to provide insights from on implementations of current preservation tools and to consider the opportunities in deploying and integrating these tools with local digital content management processes. Please see abstract below: Abstract As cultural heritage organizations seek solutions, open source, community-based, and commercial digital preservation systems and tools have proliferated. Nevertheless, given the magnitude of digital content and the requirements of specific file formats, institutions struggle to integrate disparate tools and…
Past Event
November 4, 2021

Are Big Deal cancellations a big deal for OA publishers?

Oya Y. Rieger and Danielle Cooper Present at 2021 Charleston Library Conference

On November 4, Oya Y. Rieger and Danielle Cooper will present at the Charleston Conference on the results from their research report on the impacts of ‘Big Deal’ cancellations on discovery and access to journal content. For more information, please visit this site.  Abstract The recent Ithaka S+R Research Report ‘ What’s the Big Deal – How Researchers are Navigating Changes to Journal Access’ provided an in-depth analysis of researcher perceptions of the impacts of ‘Big Deal’ cancellations on…
Past Event
November 3, 2021

Roger Schonfeld at 2021 Charleston Library Conference

On November 3, Roger Schonfeld will discuss with other other panelists how to design library services that reach library users outside of library-preferred workflows  For more information, please visit this link. Abstract “How do libraries add value for patrons increasingly working outside library-preferred workflows (e.g. searching via Google Scholar), and accessing the library’s collection off-campus? This is a question of profound relevance to all library stakeholders – librarians, publishers, and patrons alike – and one that must be addressed…
Blog Post
August 5, 2021

Deadline Extended: Call for Proposals on Leveraging Data Communities to Advance Open Science

Ithaka S+R is currently accepting applications from researchers interested in participating in Leveraging Data Communities to Advance Open Science, an NSF-funded workshop developed in partnership with the Data Curation Network. Participants will receive funding to attend a two-day incubation workshop in 2022, as well as expert guidance from information professionals about how to create sustainable infrastructures to support voluntary data sharing across disciplinary and institutional boundaries. Applications are due October 1, 2021. Please see the following CFP for full…
Blog Post
August 4, 2021

New Questionnaire for the Ithaka S+R Faculty Survey 2021 Now Available

We’re excited to announce that we have now finalized updates for the 2021 edition of the Ithaka S+R Faculty Survey, which we will be fielding nationally and with a number of college and university partners this fall. As with previous cycles of the survey, the instrument will explore the research, teaching, and publishing practices and perspectives of scholars at four-year colleges and universities. We have also expanded several areas of coverage within the questionnaire to cover instructional support services,…
Blog Post
July 14, 2021

Why Survey Testing is Essential

Preparing to Field the US Faculty Survey 2021

Ithaka S+R is gearing up for our eighth launch of the US Faculty Survey this fall. This national survey has yielded longitudinal data on scholarly research and teaching behaviors across a variety of institutional and disciplinary contexts on a triennial basis since 2000. To maximize the value of this initiative for higher education leaders, scholarly societies, academic libraries, and publishers who have come to rely on these data, especially in light of the…
Past Event
June 24, 2021

Library Support for Equitable Access to Knowledge

Roger Schonfeld Speaks at Society for College and University Planning Webinar

On June 24, Roger Schonfeld will join higher education administrators, planners, designers, and library stakeholders to discuss the challenges to higher education in a changing world and how more deeply to engage libraries to enable institutional achievement. Abstract In a climate of anti-intellectualism, institutions of higher education remain committed to making knowledge accessible and translating research to help solve society’s pressing challenges. Libraries have long served as stewards of research publications and creative academic output, facilitating access. How are they…
Blog Post
June 22, 2021

New Report: What’s the Big Deal? 

How Researchers Are Navigating Changes to Journal Access

Since 1996, the “Big Deal” has enabled academic libraries of all sizes to license bundled access to a publisher’s journal at a significant discount off the list prices. Over the years, as Big Deal spending has come to occupy a greater and greater share of materials budgets, libraries have come to question the value of their Big Deal subscriptions, with some opting to cancel or significantly alter their existing arrangements. Today we are thrilled to announce a…
Blog Post
June 22, 2021

Cancelling the Big Deal Project Spotlight

An Interview with Freie Universität Berlin with contributions from Dominik Hagel, Franziska Harnisch, Mario Kowalak, and Cosima Wagner

As university budgets face considerable strain and new models for providing open access to scholarly communication proliferate, academic libraries are increasingly pursuing alternatives to the “Big Deal” journal subscription model, including cancellation. But how are these strategies affecting researchers and what do they make of them? Over the past year Ithaka S+R has been studying the impact of Big Deal cancellations on its users in partnership with 11 academic libraries. Previous research has focused primarily on…