Meeting with Biology department faculty (4/24/2015)

Attendees:

Laurie Cook

Craig Lending

Bernardo Ortega

Michel Pelletier

Adam Rich

Rongkun Shen

Rey Sia

Stuart Tsubota

 

The Biology department had serious concerns about student work appearing in Digital Commons. Their primary concern is that the work contained data belonging to them, and that by having it Open Access, their research and data might get "scooped". They (specifically Laurie Cook) expressed surprise when they Googled their name and found theses written by students that had advised in Digital Commons, as well as some Senior Honor Theses.

Question 1: How and why is this type of work in Digital Commons?
Answer: all documents in both series were vetted by faculty (in the paper form), and the theses are posted with permission of the student.

Question 2: Are we required to post theses in Digital Commons?
Answer: Yes, according to College Senate Resolution #03 2013-2014, signed by Dr. Halstead on 11/22/13, "If an academic department requires graduate students to submit master's theses or capstone projects to The College at Brockport's Deake Library, they need to do so electronically to Digital Commons, Brockport's online repository. This will increase the visibility of graduate student scholarship and make it available online for broad public and archival access." This was submitted by James Spiller, Dean of the Graduate School in 10/2013.

Position (Tsubota and Rich): Why don't we just not submit the thesis then until we have published our research, whether in 2 or 5 years time?
Counter (Sia, Chair): This is too long a time, and places a burden on the faculty to follow through. What if you leave before then?
Question (Tsubota): What if we place it in multiple drives - faculty adviser, dept chair, grad chair?
Counter (Sia): Too dispersed, and no guarantee it will be followed through on.

Question (??): I've heard that ESB has placed an embargo on their theses, is this something we can do?
Answer: The embargo for ESB is one year from date of acceptance with automatic open access at the end of this. This is something we could do for you, as well.

Question (Tsubota, et al): We want a 5 year embargo.
Position (Sia): Is this really necessary?
Answer (Myers): This is something that would have to be approved at a college level.

Position (Cook): Before, when theses were just in paper, you had to go to the library catalog to find them, and to the library to read them. This did not concern us. We are concerned with even having the titles and abstracts online.
Comment (Myers): In recent years, World Cat has become searchable online, as well.

Further discussion ensued, including the rights of the graduate student to showcase their thesis; their desire to be able to use it as an example of their research skills, add it to their LinkedIn profile, or put a link on a resume or grad school application. In the end, Rey Sia and Michel Pelletier seemed to be in favor of making theses Open Access as soon as possible, with the remainder of the faculty leaning the other way.

Proposed solution (Myers): Open the Biology thesis collection to student submission, with faculty adviser approval required before posting. Investigate possibility of one year embargo, with the ability of the faculty member to extend it on an annual basis for up to a number of years not to exceed 5, if this is acceptable to college administration. 

Thoughts: Is this a win or a loss? Considering their desire to stop publishing their theses altogether, or indefinitely, I think it is the first step to a compromise solution. I felt like I was well received by the faculty, and what they thought would be a quick 30 minute discussion, went on for an hour when I summed up what we had discussed, and told them that I wanted to be respectful of their time on a Friday afternoon, and I'd be happy to come back and discuss it further, after I have more information. They invited me back, so I feel like the meeting was a success.

Interestingly, I walked to my car with Adam Rich, and he commented on the lack of consideration in general given to the graduate student's point of view in the discussion. I also talked to him about JOVE and visual experiments and he expressed an interest in finding out more about putting those online, as well as having a robust Spectrum journal (he mentioned Laurie Cook as a potential member of the board), and said there has to be some sort of incentive to get faculty to participate.