{"id":797,"date":"2011-04-13T16:14:17","date_gmt":"2011-04-13T20:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/?p=797"},"modified":"2011-04-13T16:14:17","modified_gmt":"2011-04-13T20:14:17","slug":"letters-in-recognition-of-the-nih-public-access-policy-anniversary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2011\/04\/13\/letters-in-recognition-of-the-nih-public-access-policy-anniversary\/","title":{"rendered":"Letters in recognition of the NIH Public Access Policy anniversary"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

In recognition of the third anniversary of the establishment of the NIH Public Access Policy<\/a> on April 7, 2008<\/a>, I’ve sent letters to John Holdren<\/a>, Director of the\u00a0Office of Science and Technology Policy<\/a>;\u00a0Francis Collins<\/a>., Director of the National Institutes of Health<\/a>; and Kathleen Sebelius<\/a>, Secretary of Health and Human Services<\/a>. The letter to Dr. Holdren is duplicated below; the others are substantially similar. The Alliance for Taxpayer Access<\/a> provides further background<\/a>.<\/p>\n

April 13, 2011<\/p>\n

John Holdren
\nAssistant to the President for Science and Technology
\nDirector, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President
\nNew Executive Office Building
\n725 – 17th Street NW
\nWashington, DC 20502<\/p>\n

Dear Dr. Holdren:<\/p>\n

I write to you in my role as the Director of the Office for Scholarly Communication at Harvard University, where I lead efforts to broaden access to the research\u00a0and scholarly results of our university. I and others at Harvard working towards these goals so central to the university’s mission have been inspired by the\u00a0National Institutes of Health Public Access Policy, now celebrating its third anniversary. The NIH policy has had an enormous impact in increasing availability\u00a0of government-funded research to the citizens that have supported it through their tax dollars. Every day nearly half a million people access the over two\u00a0million articles that the NIH policy makes available through the PubMed Central repository. I am especially proud that Harvard affiliates have contributed over\u00a0thirty thousand of these articles.<\/p>\n

The NIH should be applauded for these efforts to bring the fruits of scientific research to the public, and should be encouraged to provide even more timely\u00a0access by shortening the embargo period in the policy. I believe that the NIH example should be broadly followed by all government agencies engaged in\u00a0substantial research funding, as envisioned in the Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA) that has several times been introduced in Congress, and\u00a0encourage you to\u00a0extend this kind of policy to other science and technology funding agencies as soon as possible<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The tremendous success of the NIH policy should be celebrated. \u00a0It provides a sterling example of government acting in the public interest, leading to broader\u00a0access to the important scientific results that inform researchers and lay citizens alike.<\/p>\n

Sincerely,<\/p>\n

Stuart M. Shieber
\nWelch Professor of Computer Science, and
\nDirector, Office for Scholarly Communication<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In recognition of the third anniversary of the establishment of the NIH Public Access Policy on April 7, 2008, I’ve sent letters to John Holdren, Director of the\u00a0Office of Science and Technology Policy;\u00a0Francis Collins., Director of the National Institutes of Health; and Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services. The letter to Dr. Holdren […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2110,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[618,68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-access","category-scholarly-communication"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5pLfN-cR","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":858,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2011\/06\/07\/the-nih-responds-to-my-letter\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":0},"title":"The NIH responds to my letter","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Tuesday, June 7, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Front steps of National Library of Medicine, 2008, photo courtesy of NIH Image Bank Imagine my surprise when I actually received a response to my letters in recognition of the NIH public access policy, a form letter undoubtedly, but nonetheless gratefully received. And as a side effect, it allows us\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Front steps of National Library of Medicine, 2008, photo courtesy of NIH Image Bank","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/files\/2011\/06\/nlm-203x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":373,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2010\/01\/22\/373\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":1},"title":"Harvard response to White House RFI on public access policies","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Friday, January 22, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Harvard's provost Steven Hyman has submitted a response on behalf of the university to the White House Office for Science and Technology Policy's RFI on public access policies. It should appear on the OSTP blog within a day or so, and is duplicated here as well. I am in strong\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1691,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2013\/02\/28\/open-letter-on-the-white-house-public-access-directive\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":2},"title":"Open letter on the White House public access directive","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Thursday, February 28, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"...White House... \"White House\" image by flickr user Trevor McGoldrick. As has been widely reported, this past Friday the White House directed essentially all federal funding agencies to develop open access policies over the next few months. I wrote the letter below to be forwarded to faculty at the Harvard\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":206,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2009\/06\/24\/206\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":3},"title":"Institute of Education Sciences has an open access policy","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Wednesday, June 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I haven't seen it discussed anywhere, but it seems that the Institute of Education Sciences in the Department of Education is now requiring its funded research be made openly available through the ERIC repository. The policy looks analogous to that of the NIH.\u00a0 The pertinent clause from the current IES\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1533,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2012\/10\/08\/open-access-week-2012-at-harvard\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":4},"title":"Open Access Week 2012 at Harvard","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Monday, October 8, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"...set the default... Here's what's on deck at Harvard for Open Access Week 2012 (reproduced from the OSC announcement). From October 22 through October 28, Harvard University is joining hundreds of other institutions of higher learning\u00a0to celebrate\u00a0Open Access Week, a global event for the promotion of free, immediate online access\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1284,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2012\/03\/30\/statement-before-the-house-science-committee\/","url_meta":{"origin":797,"position":5},"title":"Statement before the House Science Committee","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Friday, March 30, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cMajesty of Law\u201d Statue in front of the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C., photo by flickr user NCinDC, used by permission (CC-by-nd) Here is my written testimony filed in association with my appearance yesterday at the\u00a0hearing on \"Federally Funded Research: Examining Public Access and Scholarly Publication Interests\" before\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=797"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":818,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797\/revisions\/818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}