6.3 'Open' Initiatives in Higher Education Institutions: Towards an Integrated Strategy
Creators: name: Sheila Corrall, and Stephen Pinfield
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2015
Subjects: integrated strategy, higher education, Open Initiatives

description: Open approaches in higher education have evolved from open source software, open access to research, and open courseware, to initiatives concerned with infrastructure and process. Open science typifies this broader conception, but can be interpreted differently by stakeholders. Open developments are gaining impetus from bottom-up movements and top-down forces, but practitioner tactics and institutional policies rarely consider openness holistically, aspiring to similar goals without seeing the benefits of a coordinated strategy. Adopting Boyer’s (1990; 1996) expanded model of scholarship as a set of interlocking activities that includes integration, application, teaching, and public engagement, alongside discovery; and building on the e-Infranet (2012; 2013) survey on open and call for policy integration; we argue that the commonalities and shared benefits of different opens constitute a convincing case for higher education institutions to pursue a unified strategy (Corrall &amp; Pinfield, 2014; 2015), and that by extending their advocacy and policy efforts to additional open types and domains, libraries can strengthen their position as partners and leaders in open science. Our research aims to describe what an integrated open strategy for a university could look like, addressing both content and process dimensions of strategy formation. Using a multistrand mixed-methods design, we explore policies for open domains from different countries. We sourced our data from institutional websites, using procedures from prior strategy studies (Corrall, 2007; McNicol, 2005), and analysed them using the 5W1H model from journalism and education studies (Why? What? When? Where? Who? How?) as an evaluation framework (Pan &amp; Kosicki, 1993; Patton, 1988). We use the results to elaborate the major components of a coherent open strategy, incorporating themes such as governance, licensing, and funding, and discussing issues such as stakeholders, skills, and culture. The next phase is a large-scale international survey that will test our framework quantitatively with a more diverse sample. The proposed paper will share findings to date, including our typology of open domains, features of good practice from analysis of atomistic policies, and suggested components and requirements for development of holistic policies. We shall also address the role of strategies and policies in creating capacity and changing behaviour, and the contribution of libraries in promoting open scholarship. <strong>Sheila Corrall</strong> joined the School of Information Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh in 2012, following eight years at the University of Sheffield iSchool. She previously worked at the British Library and as director of library and information services at three UK universities. She teaches courses on Academic Libraries, Research Methods, and Academic Culture &amp; Practice. Her research interests include the application of strategic management concepts and tools to library and information work; the changing landscape of open scholarship; collection development in the digital world; and the evolving roles and competencies of library and information specialists. She is a member of the advisory board of Credo Reference and serves on the editorial boards of six international journals. <strong>Stephen Pinfield</strong> joined the Information School at the University of Sheffield in 2012, having previously worked as a senior information practitioner in the UK Higher Education sector; latterly as Chief Information Officer at the University of Nottingham with responsibility for a large converged IT and library service supporting Nottingham’s campuses in the UK, China and Malaysia. He has experience of leading a wide range of research and development projects and participating in national policy initiatives, and brings this experience to bear on his research and teaching. His main interests focus on managing and developing information and technology services in organisations, skills development for information professionals, scholarly communication, digital information resources management, ‘openness’, and information-related policies in organisations.