Africa: Open Access Day 2008

This list is part of the Open Access Directory.

American University of Ciaro, Eygpt

 * Contact: Hani Morsi
 * Location, if available:
 * Link for more details, if available:
 * We're considering options but will definitely mark the day.

Open University of Sudan Library, Ministry of higher education, Sudan

 * Contact: Abdalaziz Gabir, abdalazizgabir[@]yahoo.com
 * Location, if available:
 * Link for more details, if available:
 * Benefits of Open Access at the web-site of the Open University of Sudan - selected translations from English to Arabic to contribute to the awareness raising among Arabic countries - and at the Ministry of Higher Education website.

Universidade Politécnica in Mozambique

 * Contact: Aissa Mitha Issak, eIFL country coordinator in Mozambique, amissak[@]apolitecnica.ac.mz
 * Aissa Mitha Issak will write an article about Open Access to publish in the national newspaper (in the Wednesdays cultural supplement where they also publish academic and research articles.
 * Aissa Mitha Issak plan to go on a radio show - Radio Mozambique - on the 14th and speak about the Open Access. The format is still discussed - either debates about access to information, or an interview.
 * Aissa Mitha Issak is translating "We Support Open Access Flyer" into Portuguese language and will share the translation.

University of Pretoria, South Africa
We hosted in total 9 open sessions on UPSpace, the open access digital research repository of the University of Pretoria: what UPSpace is all about, and how researchers can benefit from making their research available on this repository. This includes conference papers, data sets, articles, video clips, sound clips, special collections donated, newspaper clippings etc. The sessions were attended by approximately 200 researchers in total. The outcome of it was a huge interest by some of the researchers, and many have requested that their material be submitted to the repository. From 2009 we will conduct formal training sessions where researchers will learn how to do it themselves. Access the presentation: Research @ UPSpace: cited more, safe forever
 * Contact: Ina Smith E-mail: ina.smith@up.ac.za (Institutional Repository Manager)
 * Location, if available: UPSpace
 * Link for more details, if available:

"Posters promoting Open Access were posted on the walls in the main library and faculty libraries. Many prominent faculty members and researchers also participated by pledging their support to Open Access and their personal messages were displayed in a PowerPoint show which ran during the course of the week.

Students in brightly coloured Open Access T-shirts walked around in the library enlightening fellow-students on the advantages of the Open Access material and encouraging them to make use of the University of Pretoria’s Open Access repositories UPSpace and UPeTD." (Acknowledgement)

View some pictures:

Photo of presentation in foyer of library (Acknowledgement)

Poster designed for Open Access Day (Acknowledgement)

Read what our researchers have to say on Open Access:

View the Open Access Day Presentation which were on display during the course of the day

Durban University of Technology (DUT), South Africa
In celebration of Open Access Day, DUT Libraries will host an informal open session on the Institutional Repository and how researchers can get their research ready for submission into the Repository
 * Contact: Pam Govender, pamgoven[@]dut.ac.za; Web & IT Support Officer
 * Location, if available: DUT Library, ML Sultan Library
 * Link for more details, if available:

University of Johannesburg, South Africa

 * Contact: Pavlinka Kovatcheva, Subject Librarian: Sciences, University of Johannesburg, Kingsway Campus, pkovatcheva[@]uj.ac.za.
 * Location, if available: University of Johannesburg Library and Information centre promoted Open Access day (UJ Science Librarian Blog: http://ujsciencelibrarianblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/open-access-day-14-october-2008.html and UJ Librarians News: http://ujlibrariansnews.blogspot.com/2008/09/open-access-day-october-14-2008.html).
 * Link for more details, if available:

Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), South Africa
Open Access Day Programme 09:00 - 09:30 TOdB Workflow: Submitting Research Reports 10:00 - 10:30 RefWorks: From citation to bibliography 11:00 - 11:30 H-Index: Determine your stature as a researcher 12:00 - 12:30 Patents and Prior art searching 14:00 - 14:30 CSIR Research Space 15:00 - 16:00 Eve Gray - Keynote Speaker - Open Access Publishing
 * Contact: Siphethile Muswelanto E-mail: smuswelanto@csir.co.za
 * Location, if available: CSIR Research Space
 * More information: