The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC), the Public Library of Science (PLoS), and Students for FreeCulture have jointly announced the first international Open Access Week (October 19 - 23, 2009). Open Access Week builds on the momentum generated by the 120 campuses in 27 countries that celebrated Open Access Day in 2008.
The now-annual event, expanded from one day to a full week, presents an opportunity to broaden awareness and understanding of Open Access to research, including access policies from all types of research funders, within the international higher education community and the general public. Key new contributors, who will help to enhance and expand the global reach of this popular event in 2009 include eIFL.net (Electronic Information for Libraries), OASIS (the Open Access Scholarly Information Sourcebook); and the Open Access Directory (OAD).
This year's programme will highlight educational resources on Open Access that local hosts can use to customise their own programmes to suit local audiences and time zones. OASIS will serve as the centerpiece of the 2009 programme, delivering resources for every constituency and every awareness level. The Open Access Directory will again provide an index of participants on five continents, as well as their growing clearinghouse for all OA resources. Through the collaborative functionality of the two initiatives, OA videos, briefing papers, podcasts, slideshows, posters and other informative tools will be drawn from all over the Web to be highlighted during Open Access Week.
The organisers will also work with registrants to develop a variety of sample programme tracks, such as 'Administrator's introduction to campus open-access policies and funds,' 'OA 101,' and 'Complying with the NIH public access policy' that take full advantage of available tools.
