WEBINAR Open Science and the academic recognition and rewards: A new vision from Utrecht University

The system of recognition and rewards available is seen by researchers and policy makers alike as the most important in effecting the change towards open science. Transforming the way research and researchers are evaluated and incentivized has proven to be difficult because the evaluation criteria and customs are often engrained in academic cultures. In the current system, researchers and their research are judged by journal impact factors, publisher brands and H-indices, and not by actual quality, real use, real impact and openness characteristics. Under those circumstances, at best open science practices are seen as posing an additional burden without rewards. At worst, they are seen as actively damaging chances of future funding and promotion & tenure. Early career researchers are perhaps the most dependent on traditional evaluation culture for career progression, a culture held in place by established researchers, as well as by institutional, national and international policies, including funder mandates.

The speakers present the experience of the Utrecht University regarding the changes in their promotion and tenure systems, and how they have been facing the developments and challenges of open science practices.

 

 

Frank Miedema is Vice Rector of Research at Utrecht University and Chair of the Utrecht University Open Science Programme. He studied biochemistry at the University of Groningen, specialising in Immunology, with a minor in the Philosophy of Science. From January 2009 to March 2019, he was a dean and vice chairman of the Executive Board of the University Medical Center Utrecht. https://www.uu.nl/staff/FMiedema

 

Bianca Kramer is subject specialist Life Sciences and Medicine at Utrecht University Library and member of the working group on Recognition and Rewards of the Utrecht University Open Science Programme. She studied Biology at Wageningen University. She did her PhD at Radboud University Nijmegen, and subsequently did a postdoc in Toronto, Canada. Since 2008 she works at Utrecht University Library.