Hi Everybody!
Earlier this month, I shared that GOSH will be hosting a series of writing sprints to bring forward recommendations in the GOSH Community Roadmap: namely to develop guidance on Open Science Hardware (OScH) aimed at research funders, academic institutions (particularly technology transfer offices), and science policymakers. You can see the original forum post here. I am happy to announce that our first writing workshop, focused on developing guidance on supporting open science hardware for Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs) and convened by Jenny Molloy, will be held on March 8th at 14:00 -16:30 UTC!
These workshops are convened by GOSH community members, funded by Alfred P Sloan Foundation and coordinated by Gathering for Open Science Hardware Inc, a US-based nonprofit.
After these three key policy areas from the Roadmap have been addressed (and the Community Council is seated to put in place a community application process) an open call will be made for any member of the GOSH community to apply for funding for workshops on different areas of policy and research that can help make open science hardware ubiquitous by 2025.
March 8th GOSH Writing Sprint - Tech Transfer Offices
14:00-16:30 UTC
Summary
A series of three policy briefing workshops based around key recommendations in the GOSH Roadmap will be taking place March-May 2021, with the first focused on developing guidance on supporting open science hardware for Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs) on March 8th at 14:00 -16:30 UTC.
The initial workshop will include around 15 participants who have experience working in, working with, or researching TTOs in some form and can speak to the challenges and make recommendations. The resulting briefing will be circulated to the community for further suggestions and comments.
If you’d like to participate or you would like to nominate someone you think would be a great person to have in the room, please let us know via this form.
Background
Several recommendations were made in the GOSH Roadmap Support Section around institutional support. These included providing appropriate support for open science hardware translation through technology transfer offices at universities, which are a major source of open hardware, although of course they are far from being the only source. A roadmap action was generated to “Write a briefing document for technology transfer offices” and the topic has emerged in numerous forms since then, including the Open Hardware in Academia meeting organised at the University of Bath and attended by several GOSH community members.
Three workshops are now being planned by GOSH community members to bring forward policy guidance around OScH for three major stakeholders identified in the GOSH Roadmap: institutional tech transfer offices, research funders and governments or influential non-governmental organisations. This will be undertaken through a series of policy brief workshops from now until May 2021 and the first of these, on March 8th, will focus on guidance for technology transfer offices.
These workshops are convened by GOSH community members, funded by Alfred P Sloan Foundation and coordinated by Gathering for Open Science Hardware Inc, a US-based nonprofit. You can find more information in the Summary of GOSH Sloan Foundation-Funded Activities 2020-22 document. 1
What will we do?
Participants will summarise the main challenges facing both open science hardware developers attempting to navigate knowledge or technology transfer with a TTO and challenges for TTOs dealing with open science hardware projects. A set of recommendations targeting TTOs on how to better support OScH projects will then be drawn up and prioritised.
What will be the outcome?
A briefing for institutional technology transfer offices around what open science hardware is, why it matters and how they might alter their policies and practices to better support OScH. This will be written up as a report that can be circulated to heads of TTOs and to TTO organisations e.g. AUTM, Praxis Unico and regional equivalents.
By bringing perspectives from “different sides of the table” and from different fields, regions and types of institutions we hope the recommendations will have broad applicability and be useful for GOSH community members when working with their own TTOs.
How do I join?
Submit an application for the March 1st Writing Sprint focused on Tech Transfer Offices now via this form. Places are capped at 15 to keep the event manageable but all input is welcome on the resulting briefing.
I look forward to seeing some of you at the first workshop!
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