[OPEN Science Seminar] Recognition and Rewards in Academia – Towards Open Science for a Better World
October 2nd, 2025
2pm – 4pm in Village Building (A327) & on Zoom
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Speaker: Paul BOSELIE, Full Professor in Public Administration and Organization Science at Utrecht University
abstract
The Annual Meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology in San Francisco in 2012 can be considered the starting point of the global Open Science movement. This event also marks the Declaration of Research Assessment (DORA), that is worldwide acknowledged by universities and individuals in 166 different countries. Other international initiatives towards open science are the Leiden Manifesto (2015), the Dutch UNL et al. position paper on recognition and rewards (2019), the Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA, 2022) and the Barcelona Declaration (2024) (Kramer and Bosman, 2024). The Open Science movement in academia is aimed at open access, FAIR data and software, public engagement, open education, and an alternative framework for recognition and rewards of scholars. The open science critiques on contemporary science can be summarized as follows (Miedema, 2022): First, there is too much focus on the individual instead of the collective.
Second, there is also too much focus on research, often ignoring other academic activities such as (open) education and contributions to society. Third, there is a lack of attention for both academic leadership and team science. Fourth, there is way too much focus on poor and simplistic one dimensional performance indicators, in particular the Journal Impact Factor (JIF) and the h-index.
Fifth, there is a lack of open sources, both in terms of open access of publications and open data plus
open software. And finally, there is too much emphasis on competition instead of cooperation on both the institutional (university) and the individual employee level. Open science is considered to be the gateway to science for a better world. An alternative recognition and rewards in academia, for example the central focus of CoARA (https://coara.org/), is required that shape the necessary transformation. The TRIPLE model at Utrecht University (team spirit, research, impact, professional performance, leadership and education) was introduced in 2021 as part of the open science strategy and is now implemented in the university. A different way of working goes hand in hand with challenges, favoring and hindering factors. Change is coming and possible.