University Libraries

Big Ten Academic Alliance hosting library, open scholarship discussions

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Big Ten Academic Alliance is hosting a series of online meetings on open scholarship during the week of Jan. 9 as part of its ongoing “Sequence of Convenings Toward the BIG Collection.” This series of discussions aims to align resources and activities across Big Ten Academic Alliance library initiatives.

The plenary session, “Open Publishing and Open Scholarship in the Big Ten: A Perspective from Faculty Authors and Researchers,” is open to library employees and research/teaching faculty across Big Ten campuses and will begin at 11 a.m. (EST) on Monday, Jan. 9, on Zoom, no registration required.

During this session, two faculty panels — one each from the perspective of the sciences and social sciences and from the arts and humanities, will review the current state of open scholarship on Big Ten campuses. Participants will be able to choose which panel they would like to attend.

The libraries of the Big Ten Academic Alliance, including Penn State University Libraries, are engaged partners in advancing the growth of more equitable open science and open scholarship by helping to shape a sustainable, scalable, trustworthy and just open knowledge ecosystem. Throughout the week, faculty from across Big Ten institutions will speak to their perspective on the value of open access publishing to their work, its current state and prospects for the future. These later, focused conversations have limited seating and require pre-registration.

Opening session panelists include:

Arts and Humanities Panel

  • Torsten Reimer, university librarian and dean, University of Chicago (host)

  • Harmony Bench, associate professor, Department of Dance, Ohio State University

  • Holly Brewer, Burke Professor of American History, University of Maryland

  • TJ Billard, assistant professor, School of Communication, Northwestern University

  • Josephine Lee, professor of English and Asian American studies, University of Minnesota

Sciences and Social Sciences Panel

  • Beth McNeil, dean of Libraries, Purdue University (host)

  • Michael Dougherty, chair, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland

  • Sylvie Brouder, professor of agronomy, Purdue University

  • Bryan Carstens, chair, Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, Ohio State University

  • Moin Syed, professor, Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota

Focused conversations

Kate McCready, the Big Ten’s Visiting Program Officer for Academy Owned Scholarly Publishing, will host a series of focused conversations over the course of the week of Jan. 9. Seats in the conversations are limited, to allow for rich interaction and discussion. Advance registration is required to receive the Zoom link and additional information. Times listed are in Eastern Standard Time.

  • 2–3:15 p.m., Jan. 10: “A Culture of Open Access and Open Scholarship on Campus,” Karl Broman, professor, Department of Biostatistics & Medical Informatics, University of Wisconsin

  • 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m., Jan. 11: “The BTAA Libraries’ Open Scholarship Strategy,” Kate McCready, VPO for academy owned scholarly publishing, and Maurice York, director of library initiatives, Big Ten Academic Alliance

  • 2 to 3:15 p.m., Jan. 11: “Library-Faculty Collaboration on Publishing Data Analysis,” Dan Coughlin, head of Libraries Strategic Technologies, Penn State University Libraries

  • Noon to 1:15 p.m., Jan. 12: “The Political Economy of Academic Publishing,” Joel Wainwright, professor of geography, Ohio State University

Recordings from previous sessions of “A Sequence of Convenings Toward the BIG Collection” are on the BTAA website

Last Updated January 6, 2023