Monthly Archives: October 2015
OA and the research lifecycle 2: producing the research proposal
Your research proposal is likely to address a range of issues arising throughout the research lifecycle, some of which are covered by the other posts in this series. To avoid repetition, in this post I will focus on some of the things to consider if you plan to engage with open access in a collaborative project.
OA and the research lifecycle 1: identifying a new research area
Open access to published work
Whether you already have an idea for a new research area or are uncertain where to start, gaining an overview of the current literature is critical. Fortunately, not all of this is hidden behind paywalls. Thanks to those researchers who have been willing to disseminate their work through open access repositories and journals, there is now a substantial quantity of research available freely to all.
Much of this is harvested by CORE (COnnecting REpositories). CORE’s mission is to “aggregate all open access research outputs from repositories and journals worldwide and make them available to the public” (About CORE). CORE currently indexes nearly 25 million open access articles.
Online tutorials for PGR students and early career researchers
There are now five new interactive tutorials on the Skills Hub. You will find them in a new section ‘Postgraduate Research Skills‘ on the ‘Academic Skills‘ tab.
- Author bibliometrics – examines the key author bibliometrics and their use
- Journal bibliometrics – explores the use of impact factors and other metrics for ranking journals
- Journals and articles – addresses your publication strategy, journal types and what makes a ‘good’ paper
- Other forms of publishing – covers posters, exhibitions, creative works, website authoring and Open Access publishing
- Networking – making the most of face to face and online networking with fellow researchers
Open Access Week webinars
Next week (October 19th to 25th) is international Open Access Week. It is a great time to catch up on what open access means for you and your research. Here at Northampton we will mark the occasion with a series of posts on the subject of open access throughout the research lifecycle. These will expand on the guide we produced earlier this year and will hopefully answer some of the questions you may have. Look out for them here on the Research Support Hub.
Other organisations are celebrating Open Access Week with various events, including a number of webinars which are, of course, open to everyone. Why not check out some of these?
School of the Arts research events for Autumn 2015
The School of the Arts announces its research seminars and events for autumn 2015, with a strong line-up of unique conferences, lectures and engaging seminar discussions with noted researchers and scholars. All Seminars will be held in room MR34 at 2.15pm unless otherwise stated. There will be refreshments and biscuits. All SOTA staff and students are welcome to attend.
Funding opportunity: AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnerships
The British Library is currently advertising three Collaborative Doctoral Partnerships, to begin in October 2016. The call is open to researchers of postdoctoral standing with a contract of employment with a UK HEI.
There are three research topics:
- The Working Life of Scientists: Exploring the Culture of Scientific Research
- Digital Publishing and the Reader
- Hans Sloane’s Books: Evaluating an Enlightenment Library
Further details and the application form are available from the British Library website.
UON Graduate School Blog 