Re: NIH Public Access Mandate Passes Senate

["Anthony Watkinson" <anthony.watkinson@btopenworld.com>]

I would like to comment on Ann's note. I have raised her question 
and a related question with several research councils in the UK.

Most funders require that the grantees supply them with a report 
on the research done under the terms of the grant and they ask 
that this report is written in language comprehensible to the lay 
public (actual wording varies).

If these bodies are truly interested in making the findings of 
the research funded accessible to the public why do they not make 
these reports accessible?  The answer I have received privately 
is that the reports are so badly written that they are not much 
use. If the funding bodies are happy to force scholars to publish 
only in journals that accept their demands why cannot they insist 
on reports submitted to them being written in an accessible way?

Anthony

----- Original Message -----
From: "Leah Krevit" <leah.krevit@exch.library.tmc.edu>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Friday, October 26, 2007 11:28 PM
Subject: RE: NIH Public Access Mandate Passes Senate

> [ANN'S note:  Thanks to all who clarified exactly what the 
> policy would require.  I've long wondered why these government 
> agencies are not creating their own publicly accessible Web 
> sites wherein the reports of grantees are made available. 
> Those of us who get federal grants spend *a lot* of time 
> preparing the *required* ongoing and final reports of our 
> research and progress.  The reports go ... where?  Into filing 
> cabinets or now electronic file folders, and are rarely 
> findable.  Shouldn't federal agencies mount grantee reports for 
> the public shortly after filing?  The agencies would thus be 
> providing appropriate access, authors would have a say over 
> where (Web sites, journals, repositories) and in what form 
> their papers are published.  And, publishers' value added 
> services would either find a market or not -- they would stand 
> or fall on their merits as the content would already be 
> available from the funding agencies. Don't shoot me now...]
>
> Ann, Here is the language, I think:
>
> > Under a mandatory policy, NIH-funded researchers will be
> > required to deposit copies of eligible manuscripts into the
> > National Library of Medicine's online database, PubMed Central.
> > Articles will be made publicly available no later than 12
> > months after publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
> The intention is for the published article to be made available
> publicly within one year.
>
> My understanding is that other reports, pre-prints, etc. are not
> to be reposited in PubMed Central. I guess we will know more once
> the bill becomes law. If it does.
>
> You can read the existing requirements of the NIH Public Access
> Policy here:  http://publicaccess.nih.gov/
>
> The language there is:
>
> The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Policy on Enhancing
> Public Access to Archived Publications Resulting from NIH-Funded
> Research (Public Access Policy), which took effect on May 2,
> 2005, requests and strongly encourages all investigators to make
> their NIH-funded peer-reviewed, author's final manuscript
> available to other researchers and the public through the NIH
> National Library of Medicine's (NLM) PubMed Central (PMC)
> immediately after the final date of journal publication.
>
> Best. Leah
>
> Leah Krevit, M.L.I.S.
> Associate Director
> Collections Management
> Houston Academy of Medicine -
> Texas Medical Center Library
> Houston TX 77030-2809
> leah.krevit@exch.library.tmc.edu