In the final blog in our #DRI10 series celebrating ten years of DRI, Dr Daniel Bangert reflects on DRI’s Open Science preparedness and our commitment to supporting Open Science policies and practices.
The Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI) was formed ten years ago in September 2011. It was originally funded through a PRTLI (Programme for Research in Third-Level Institutions) Cycle 5 funding grant. In this phase (2011-2015), DRI was built by a research consortium of six academic partners. It was officially launched in June 2015 and continues to be managed by three core academic institutions – Royal Irish Academy, Trinity College Dublin, and Maynooth University. To mark our ten-year anniversary, DRI staff members are writing a blog a week focusing on different DRI milestones achieved over the past ten years. This is the tenth blog in the #DRI10 celebratory blog series.
Part of the vision of the Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI) is to actively engage and contribute to national and European policy on Open Science. Open Science, also termed open research or open scholarship, encompasses a set of actions or practices that aim to make the research process more open, transparent, and inclusive. Open Science practices include early and open sharing of research, measures to manage and improve the FAIRness of research data (i.e., making it Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable), and providing open access to research outputs (e.g., publications, data, software).
DRI supports Open Science policies and practices through several strands of activities, including participation in relevant advocacy and advisory groups, provision of infrastructure to enable FAIR data, and programmes of training and outreach. For example, DRI staff have served on expert groups and contributed to funded research projects with the Research Data Alliance (RDA), the OECD, ALLEA, Europeana, the European Commission, and the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).
A specific focus for DRI has been the provision of trusted and sustainable data infrastructure that is aligned with the disciplinary practices and needs of the arts, humanities, and social sciences. To meet international best practice, DRI is certified by the globally recognised CoreTrustSeal and has addressed different elements of the FAIR principles through its repository architecture and capabilities, as detailed in DRI’s statement on FAIR.
At the national level, DRI collaborates with and contributes to Ireland’s National Open Research Forum (NORF). NORF was established in 2017 to drive the Irish agenda for open research and prepared Ireland’s National Framework on the Transition to an Open Research Environment (2019). The role of NORF is to propose national actions to address the challenges of changing the Irish research system to strengthen, promote, and better support open research practices.
Through its coordination bodies and working groups, NORF combines the expertise of representatives from policy, research funders, research performing organisations, the library sector, enterprise, and other key stakeholders in the Irish research system. DRI staff involved in NORF include Dr Daniel Bangert as National Open Research Coordinator, Dr Natalie Harrower as a member of the Steering Group, and Dr Kathryn Cassidy and Kevin Long as members of NORF’s Working Groups on Infrastructures and FAIR Data respectively.
Image: Speakers from the four-part NORF webinar series on Open Research in Ireland, March – May 2021. From top left: Aoife Coffey (University College Cork), Eoghan Ó Carragáin (University College Cork), Ciara McCaffrey (University of Limerick), and Susan Reilly (University College Dublin)
The focus of NORF’s current work is to develop and deliver a National Action Plan for Open Research that will support national progress on open research and help realise the objectives of Ireland’s National Framework on the Transition to an Open Research Environment. In this context, NORF activities in 2021 have included a four-part webinar series on ‘Open Research in Ireland’, organisation of national data stewardship training in collaboration with FAIRsFAIR and EOSC Synergy, and workshops with specific communities including the Irish Humanities Alliance (IHA) and Irish scholarly publishers. These activities and further community consultations have contributed to an analysis of national open research support structures and the development of recommended actions for the National Action Plan, planned for delivery in early 2022.
By National Open Research Coordinator, Daniel Bangert
