JISC

Scholarly communication covers the authoring, dissemination and use of information within the academic community for teaching or research. JISC’s programme of work aims to make the scholarly communication process easier for researchers, teachers and learners and improve the use of research outputs by the UK educational and research communities.  These pages summarise JISC’s activities on scholarly communications, highlighting the work of the Scholarly Communication Group.

The scope of the term ‘scholarly communication’ is wider than ‘scholarly publishing’ and covers the authoring, publishing (in a broad sense), and use of information produced by members of the academic community for teaching or research.

Scholarly communication has a direct bearing upon the efficiency of the process of research, teaching and learning, and therefore contributes to the value of public investment in the educational sector. Researchers, teachers and learners need ready access to relevant work by other researchers, teachers and learners in their subject discipline if they are to build upon existing research (rather than duplicate it), teach from a base of the latest research, and learn in an environment open to a rich array of information.

Scholarly Communication Group

JISC’s programme of work in the area of scholarly communication aims to:

• Help make the scholarly communication process easier for researchers, teachers and learners
• Work towards sustainable, and where appropriate, new forms of scholarly communication so research outputs can be effectively used by the UK educational and research communities.

The Scholarly Communication Group works together with the academic, library and publishing communities to identify and discuss issues of change in the dissemination, retention, curation and use of research outputs, for mutual benefit. The Group also fosters relationships with a number of different organizations and stakeholders in conjunction with the JISC Partnership Programme, both within the UK and internationally.

The Scholarly Communication Group page includes the Group’s terms of reference and a list of members.

These pages summarise the JISC programme of work in the area of scholarly communications.  They describe the many research studies commissioned and events organised by the Scholarly Communications Group, and joint initiatives with the JISC Journals Working Group and JISC Partnership Programme.  Many useful resources for the academic community emerging from JISC development programmes are also described.