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Newcastle University and Open Research

Institutional Position Statement

1. What is Open Research?

Open Research is a means of maximising the visibility and impact of research for public benefit in accordance with the University Vision and Strategy. The increased transparency, reliability and reproducibility of Open Research has the potential to improve public trust, promote inclusivity and lead to the creation and use of new knowledge.

Open Research aims to increase openness throughout the whole research life cycle by providing free access to research methods and protocols, data, software and publications.

2. Why is it important?

Newcastle University recognises that open research supports the delivery of our research strategy's ambition to catalyse transformative research within and between disciplines. It helps build a positive, inclusive, and thriving research culture. As part of the University's Research Culture Action Plan, we aim to embed open research practices into 'business as usual'. 

Our commitment to open research is fully aligned with government and major funder requirements for greater transparency, collaboration and sharing.

3. Principles

Research culture and methodology in different disciplines influences the approach taken to demonstrate a commitment to Open Research. Some of the different ways in which researchers can achieve this are:

  1. making research methods, software, outputs and data open as early as possible
  2. archiving and sharing data, code, data management plans, methods in data.ncl or appropriate data repository (abiding by principles of FAIR data and funder requirements)
  3. pre-registering research study plans and submitting them to an appropriate registry
  4. sharing pre-prints in appropriate subject-specific repositories (e.g. arXiv, BioRXiv)
  5. publishing research outputs in open access journals or on open access platforms and including a data access  statement where appropriate
  6. registering an ORCID identifier and linking this to grants, datasets and publications
  7. encouraging research students to engage with Open Research practices (including for PhD theses)
  8. engaging in public discussions about research including science communication, data visualisation and citizen science

4. Expectations

Newcastle University is committed to Open Research and expects researchers to incorporate open research practices into their workflows to make their outputs ‘as open as possible, as closed as necessary’.

5. Support

To support our researchers in meeting these expectations we:

  • provide guidance, advice and systems to enable open sharing of research outputs
  • provide guidance on institutional and funder open research policies
  • support and invest in sustainable open access models

Open Research at the University is underpinned by our open access and research data policies

Further support is available on the library website

6. Monitoring

The University monitors the adoption of open research practices to inform and guide institutional policies and systems to support the aims of the statement. The University also monitors and reports on open research practices as required by funders.

Monitoring includes, but is not limited to, the use of internal and external systems and software that support open research, for example the University’s institutional repositories ePrints, data.ncl and eTheses, other approved repositories and the use of open access funding.