The emerging role of Institutional CRIS in facilitating Open Scholarship

Abstract

This paper and presentation describe the evolution of institutional CRIS (Current Research Information Systems) from their traditional role as a tool managed by the Research Office to manage and assess research towards more widespread uses within institutions, in particular within the Library, to facilitate Open Science. Open Science or Scholarship is one of the hottest topics around. Organisations and funders from the G8 down stress the importance of openness in driving everything from global innovation through to more accountable governance; not to mention the more direct possibility that non-compliance could result in grant income drying up for individual researchers. It focuses on the UK, using St Andrews as a detailed example, describing the organisational, procedural and technological responses to this ‘open by default’ agenda, and why and how the Library is taking a leading role in these changes.