Abstract
Open Access seems to have reached a flipping point and become a real option when researchers decide where to publish. However the figures provided when someone gives percentages are not clear because there is a lack of coincidence when defining open access. In this paper we would like to explain the project initiated by two Catalan universities, the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), which decided to use a common methodology to measure the different levels of open access in their institution. A methodology that can be used by any institution around the world to make visible their evolution and trends in the Open Access movement. Moreover, we also share a methodology to estimate the expenditure on fees to publish open access. In these two research institutions there is not a central system for processing those payments and therefore we need to make estimations in order to know how much we pay each year. Again, we think this methodology can be used worldwide. Both initiatives configure the initial work of what we called the Open Access Observatory, a project that was created aimed at providing and sharing evidences, methodologies and data in relation to open access publications.
Highlights
In July 2016, the libraries of the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) decided to organize an internal workshop to find new ways of collaboration
Looking at Pinowar et al (2018), where there is a global picture of the Open Access situation, we found some data stating that 44.7% of articles published in 2015 are Open Access
The UB values are higher than the ones from UPC probably because the journals where some disciplines publish have higher article processing charge (APC), especially in Health Sciences
Summary
In July 2016, the libraries of the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) decided to organize an internal workshop to find new ways of collaboration. The main output of the project was the establishment of an observatory providing evidences and monitoring the situation of open access in both institutions: The Open Access Observatory (UPC, 2019a). There is a clear idea that open access is growing year after year (see for instance the report from Universities UK, 2017) but not many institutions monitor this growth. During the last two years, some Catalan universities have set up “thermometers” to measure the percentage of their scientific production available in their institutional repositories. This is the case of Universitat de Barcelona (UB, 2019), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB, 2019), Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC, 2019b) and Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF, 2018)
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