Every year, SFU Library participates in Open Access Week to raise awareness of open scholarship and celebrate the work that the SFU community is doing to make knowledge public.

Take a look back at some of the activities we held in the Library for OA Week 2018, centred around the theme of Designing Equitable Foundations for Open Knowledge.

Paywall: The Business of Scholarship (movie screening)

Several curious movie-watchers gathered in a library classroom to enjoy some free popcorn and a screening of the recently-released documentary film: Paywell: The Business of Scholarship.

The film focuses on the need for open access to research and science, questions the rationale behind the $25.2 billion a year that flows into for-profit academic publishers, examines the 35-40% profit margin associated with the top academic publisher Elsevier, and looks at how that profit margin is often greater than some of the most profitable tech companies like Apple, Facebook and Google. 

We followed up the film with a brief discussion on the film, open access in general, and the ways that the library can support researchers in making their work open access, such as through the Open Access Policy, our institutional repository, Summit, and the Central Open Access Fund.

Open Access posters and table displays

Visitors to the Bennett Library at SFU Burnaby were greeted by our Open Access Week poster display offering an array of information about open access and open education, including how much journal subscriptions cost, and how much money students are saving with open textbooks.

The Belzberg Library in Vancouver and the Fraser Library in Surrey also displayed books, handouts, and magnets on the OA Week table displays.

Open but not Free: Invisible Labour in Open Scholarship

This Open Access Week panel event was co-hosted by BCcampus, SFU, BCIT, KPU, Langara, UFV and UBC and the BC Open Education Librarians (BCOEL).

Facilitated by Bronwen Sprout, Head, Digital Programs and Services at UBC Library, the panel presented a lively discussion about the impact of invisible labour in open scholarship, and the ways that current reward and incentive structures contribute to issues of sustainability in open scholarship. 

Read a reflection of the Open but not Free event by Kim O'Donnell, and watch the event recording available in UBC's Digital Repository, cIRcle.

Many thanks to our panelists, Melissa Ashman (KPU), Sanjaya Mishra (Commonwealth of Learning), Carol Munoz Nieves (SFU), and Juliet O’Brien (UBC) for their insightful contributes to this important conversation.

Ongoing activities beyond OA Week

Want to stay involved with open access now that OA Week is complete? Check out the other ways to be part of the discussion around open access.

• The GSS Open Access Award is accepting applications until November 30, 2018. This award is open to graduate students at SFU who have published their work in an open access journal. Up to 35 awards are available at $100 each.
• The President's Dream Colloquium on Making Knowledge Public is pleased to offer two upcoming events:
  • Global participation in Knowledge Production with Hebe Vessuri, November 8, 5:30 - 7:00pm at SFU Burnaby.
  • The Future of Public Mission of Universities with Robin DeRosa, November 22, 5:30 - 7:00pm at SFU Vancouver.
• SFU Library is hosting two workshops on November 8, immediately prior to the talk with Hebe Vessuri:
  • Communicate with Purpose and Intent, 1-1:30pm, ASB 10908
  • Towards equal, accessible, and just scholarship: Make your work discoverable through ethical publishing, 4-5:00pm, ASB 10908