JISC

The Internet has made the challenges faced by education and research global challenges and JISC’s work with international partners continues to bring direct benefits to the UK through the sharing of knowledge and expertise and the development of common approaches.

International highlights
JISC and its partners deliver a major petition succeeding in increasing interest in open access matters
Knowledge Exchange held a ‘decision-maker's forum’ to identify common and strategically important issues
Repositories workshop held with 70 technical experts from 8 European countries
JISC and SURF publish model agreement helping authors arrange publishing a journal article with publishers
JISC and the US’s National Science Foundation consider the future of research or ‘cyberscholarship’ at a conference
International e-Framework initiative welcomes New Zealand’s Ministry of Education and the SURF Foundation
Major international e-Content Policy and Strategy Symposium held
JISC commissions study exploring its activities in an international context

JISC, its Knowledge Exchange partners - the SURF Foundation, the Danish Electronic Library (DEFF) and the German Research Foundation (DFG) – and SPARC Europe worked together to deliver a major petition signed by more than 20,000 individuals and nearly 750 education, research and cultural organisations from around the world. Calling on the EC to formally endorse the recommendations outlined in the EC-commissioned Study on the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication Markets of Europe, the petition succeeded in bringing the views of the worldwide education and research community to the attention of the Commission and has been credited with contributing to its increased interest in matters related to open access and to the growing realisation among senior policy makers that such matters could have a direct and significant bearing on the worldwide impact of European research.

In October 2006, the Knowledge Exchange held a ‘decision-maker's forum’ in Berlin which brought together the leadership of the four organisations to identify common and strategically important issues. Creating a layer of scholarly and scientific content on the Internet emerged as a central theme of the partnership’s vision and, in support of this vision, member organisations agreed to coordinate their efforts on the following priorities:

• Building an integrated repository infrastructure
• Exploring new developments in the future of publishing
• Facilitating management services within education and research institutions
• Supporting the European digital libraries agenda.

In support of the first of these priorities, a workshop of some 70 technical experts from 8 European countries took place in Utrecht in January. Focusing less on theoretical discussion than practical outcomes, the workshop resulted in positions on policy debates, advice and guidance for software developers and repositories management, the identification of gaps in current funding provisions for institutional repositories and demonstrated a range of technical solutions to some of the challenges of establishing and developing repositories.

A tender process was launched by Knowledge Exchange in February 2006 to explore whether partners, working together, could deliver greater economies of scale and greater transparency in the licensing of agreements for online resources than they could individually. Forming an important element of the Knowledge Exchange’s vision to explore new developments in the future of publishing, the multinational initiative elicited bids from 22 publishers from which 10 were selected to enter the dialogue phase. Formal submissions were then received by nine publishers, representing a level of success which went far beyond the expectations of Knowledge Exchange partners. Markers from the 4 countries are currently evaluating the bids to decide which of them to take forward.

Following a lengthy period of international consultation, JISC and SURF published a model agreement that helps authors make appropriate arrangements with publishers for the publication of a journal article. The Licence to Publish establishes a balance of rights and interests in the emerging scholarly communications environment with the overarching principle being that the results of publicly funded research should be made freely and openly available, and as quickly as possible, to all who want to access them.

Identifying strategies for managing information created and used by researchers brought together senior representatives from JISC and the US’s National Science Foundation (NSF) in Phoenix, Arizona in April to consider the future of research, or 'cyberscholarship.' Participants included representatives from government, higher education, industry, and private foundations in Europe and the USA. The highly successful conference resulted in a report which called for ‘a focused, international effort to experiment, explore, and finally build the infrastructure for cyberscholarship.’

 The international e-Framework initiative continues to explore ways in which the ‘service-oriented approach’ to the deployment and development of IT systems might be applicable to education and research. During the last year the initiative welcomed 2 new partners, New Zealand’s Ministry of Education and the SURF Foundation. The initiative is built upon sharing expertise and experience and the new partners bring a great deal of specialist knowledge and understanding to the initiative - in the case of New Zealand’s Ministry of Education, in the areas of authentication and authorisation and integration services and, in the case of SURF, federated repositories, e-portfolios and the exchange of student data.

A major international e-Content Policy and Strategy Symposium was held in Cardiff in July which brought together key figures in the field of digitisation and content to discuss policy, business models, economics, technical infrastructure and collaboration and discussed ways to promote innovation in these respective areas. Both the symposium and the 2-day digitisation conference which followed it were a great success with delegates agreeing to continue to work together across international borders.                                                                                                      

In April 2007, JISC commissioned a study to explore its activities in an international context and consider its place within a global leadership of technology development and service providers for education and research. Acknowledging that JISC occupies a unique international position, the study drew upon the views of senior representatives from leading national and international organisations around the world and concluded that JISC is seen as one of a small cadre of world class organisations that provide leadership in the innovative use of ICT, encouraging and often initiating international collaboration and providing a means of influencing worldwide developments in ICT provision.