This episode features highlights from the two-day Southern Africa Regional Open Science Dialogue held at the University of Pretoria in April 2023. This engagement brought together higher education stakeholders from Southern Africa who explored key themes over the two days, such as rethinking research assessment and incentivization in academia, with the aim to foster the adoption of Open Science and Open Access principles within the region.

Episode Highlights:

(00:02:12) Ms. Joy Owango welcomes Dr. Lucienne Abrahams whose topic agenda will focus on research infrastructure and how it digitally enables open science.

(00:02:47) Dr. Lucienne Abrahams , the Director at the LINK Centre in the University of the Witwatersrand, discusses the concept of digital research infrastructure in South Africa, emphasizing its role in advancing open science and open data initiatives. The SA-DRIP platform (subject to potential name change), which aims to facilitate research practice, particularly in six domains: biodiversity and climate change, digital humanities, learning and human development, health surveillance and promotion, energy science and innovation, and mathematical, statistical, computational, and data sciences. Dr. Lucienne highlights the importance of open access to data and the collaborative nature of the platform as they unveil a high-level visual representation of this proposed digital research infrastructure. This discussion underscores the need for mobilizing data, promoting collaboration, and fostering interdisciplinary research across these domains.

(00:16:48) Ms. Ellen Tise, the chairperson of the board of Sunlink ,the Consortia of all South African Libraries, begins her discussion with focus shifting from the influence of librarians to the influence of libraries in open science. She highlights libraries' historical significance and their leadership in open science, particularly in open access and open data. She emphasizes that open science isn't a new concept, defining it as accessible and reusable science. Ms. Ellen outlines four criteria for libraries to assess their involvement in open science and suggests actionable steps for libraries to contribute to the open science movement.to assess their engagement in open science and suggests actionable steps to contribute to the movement, underlining libraries' pivotal role in promoting transparency and accessibility.

The workshop is part of an ongoing series of high-level Open Science dialogue workshops targeting institutional leadership in AAU member regions and universities with the objective of raising knowledge and awareness on the importance and best practice of Open Science and Open Access, and increase the number of Open Science mandates within higher education institutions.

The Southern Africa Regional Open Science Dialogue was a collaborative effort by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TCC Africa⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Public Library of Science (PLOS)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Association of African Universities (AAU)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Africa Open Science Platform (AOSP)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ University of Pretoria⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠University of Cape Town⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

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Owango, J., Kupe, T., Mchunu, N., Wanyenze, R., Veldsman, S., Shahungu, M., … Nxomani, C. (2023). Regional Open Science Dialogue in Southern Africa. TCC Africa. Retrieved from ⁠⁠https://tccafrica.pubpub.org/pub/hqzpi08k⁠⁠

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Mazungumzo - African Scholarly ConversationsBy Training Centre in Communication (TCC Africa)Dec 15, 2023