Today, DORA is announcing an update to its policy for organizational signatories.
What is the new policy?
Beginning on January 1, 2025, organizations and institutions that sign DORA will need to submit a public statement at the time of signing to be approved. Previously, organizations were asked to post a public statement when they signed DORA, but signatures would be approved without them, on the expectation that public statements would be forthcoming.
Why is the policy changing?
In November 2022, DORA announced its original outreach policy. This policy had a built-in “sunset clause” that required DORA leadership to review the policy in December, 2023 based on the learnings from the previous year. A task force from the DORA Steering Committee was struck to review the policy. As part of that review, DORA staff reviewed the websites of organization signatories and found that very few posted the requested public statement. This suggested that the first version of this policy was not having the desired effects, such as insuring that organizations’ communities are informed about implementation of DORA principles.
The task force also noted that organizations similar to DORA had more stringent requirements for members, and organizations were still willing to join.
DORA has now existed for ten years. While agreements to principles are still valuable and necessary parts of consciousness raising and awareness, it is time for organizations to move towards implementing DORA principles. We believe public statements are a useful starting point for organizations to articulate where they are in their reform practices and how they aspire to improve them.
What about organizations that have already signed DORA?
We will continue to encourage these organizations to post a statement. We will be reaching out to as many existing signatories as possible to suggest to them that they devise and post a public statement by January 1, 2026 and submit it to DORA staff. DORA staff will update the database as new public statements are received.
How do I know who has posted a statement?
The DORA signatory page will be updated to show the link to the public statement alongside the name of the organization.
What should be in a public statement?
Below are five steps to guide the writing of a statement:
- Identify your institution and describe the institution’s goals or priorities regarding research assessment. For example, “Our institution is a research extensive university that seeks to engage our undergraduates in research, and to ensure faculty who do so are rewarded for that work,” or “Our institution values research that impacts our regional community and is accessible in their preferred language, and we seek to ensure research outputs are not biased against non-English publications.”
- Describe DORA and link to the DORA website. For example “The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) is a global initiative dedicated to improving research assessment practices”. You may also include a DORA signatory badge.
- Indicate when the institution signed DORA and how DORA’s principles align with institutional goals. For example, “The institution signed DORA in July, 2024. Reducing our reliance on journal Impact Factors will allow our researchers a wider array of publishing options in our regional language.”
- Describe any current plans regarding research assessment and DORA implementation, with links or documents if possible (e.g., consultations, policies, strategic plans, training). For example, “The Department will be creating a task force to review its assessment practices, and is tasked with delivering a strategic plan by the end of the calendar year.”
- Provide contact information to relevant individual(s) or office(s) responsible for research assessment and DORA implementation. For example, “The implementation of DORA in the college is being administered by the Dean’s office. Questions can be directed to the Associate Dean at <email address>.”
Some examples of previous statements are below. Because they were published before this guidance, not all examples contain all of the elements listed above, but they fulfilled the original mandate to provide a public recognition of the support for DORA on their own website.
Examples of statements by universities:
- AECC Community College
- Coventry University
- Queensland University of Technology
- University of Calgary
- University of Tokyo
Examples of statements by journals or publishers:
- Revista Cientifica da UMC
- Research Lake International
- Publications scientifiques sur Museum national d’Histoire naturelle
Examples of statement by a funding agency and organizations: