The Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture has published an Atlas of Open Science and Research in Finland in 2019, which evaluates the openness of the operational culture of the country’s research organisations. The purpose of the evaluation was to examine how research organisations promote open science and research. The University of Eastern Finland was ranked at the highest level of maturity together with other multidisciplinary universities, i.e. the University of Turku, the University of Tampere and the University of Jyväskylä.
University of Eastern Finland reached the highest level of maturity in openness
Over the past years, the University of Eastern Finland has taken determined steps to develop its services and competence in the field of open science, and the results of this work can now be seen in the latest evaluation. The University of Eastern Finland improved its score from the previous evaluation in 2016, climbing to the highest maturity level in 2019. At the highest level, open science constitutes part of the university’s strategic activities.
The university’s services and policies relating to open science in particular received high scores. Nearly all scientific publications by UEF researchers are nowadays made openly accessible through the university’s open access repository. Areas most requiring development include the management of open science, providing open access to data, and competence development relating to open science. All of these will be addressed during the upcoming strategy period.
“We are convinced that open science is the most effective way to enhance and strengthen the quality and impact of research. Our next strategy period will witness increasing efforts to promote open science in Finland and abroad in collaboration with other universities, the public sector and companies,” Rector Jukka Mönkkönen says.
The University of Eastern Finland has a website for open science at https://www.uef.fi/web/open-uef/avoin-tiede . The university’s openly accessible materials can be browsed in the eRepo repository at https://erepo.uef.fi/
The evaluation by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture examined the level of maturity in open science and research of Finnish higher education institutions, research institutes, research-funding organisations, academic and cultural institutes abroad and learned societies and academies by using openly accessible data and separate requests for information. Maturity levels are defined, e.g., by indicators relating to strategic promotion of openly accessible research data and utilisation of research findings, and competence development relating to open science.
The Atlas of Open Science and Research in Finland in 2019 report is available at http://julkaisut.valtioneuvosto.fi/handle/10024/161990.
For further information, please contact:
Library Director Jarmo Saarti, jarmo.saarti(at)uef.fi, tel. +358 50 363 7904
Information Specialist Tomi Rosti, tomi.rosti(at)uef.fi, tel. +358 50 308 9977