17 May 2024
Rachel Branson - Northumbria University
I recently attended the 2024 UKSG Annual Conference and Exhibition. The UKSG conference is a massive event in the Scholarly Communications world, and it was a great chance to meet other people in the field from all over the world, as well as hearing from publishers and content providers. There were over 800 delegates and even more exhibitors and staff, so it was a lot of chatting and networking, eating and drinking, and taking in hours and hours of fantastic sessions.
Myself and my fellow award-winners. We were all from different universities, government bodies, and publishers. We had to get these professional photos taken which was a little embarrassing at the time, but it is lovely to have something to look back on. (Photo by Simon Williams)
I applied for a bursary as a first-time attendee and an early career professional. I was extremely honoured to be awarded a fully sponsored place which covered my entire attendance, including travel, accommodation, meals, and all conference events – a real treat and a made it an extra special experience overall. I really love the city of Glasgow too, and it made an excellent setting for the conference.
I spent 3 days taking in plenaries, lighting talks, breakout sessions, and visiting the stalls of over 100 exhibitors (and most importantly, getting freebies from – I collected 15 tote bags in total – thankfully I left room to fit them in my suitcase). I wanted to make the most of my experience, so I attended all of the “official” social events including the first-time attendee’s reception. I initially went to the wrong hotel on the events campus, but thankfully the Whova app saved the day. I was treated with such kindness by the UKSG staff when I arrived and was grateful for the ice cold can of Irn Bru that greeted me in my stressed and sweaty state. I also attended the quiz, where I had been invited to join a team with representatives from Kortext, COUNTER, and fellow first-time attendees. We came a very respectable 2nd place, after what felt like ten tie-breaker questions, and two plates of gnocchi. The gala reception and disco held at Glasgow Science Centre was also extremely special. It was like being a big kid - being allowed to wander and play with the exhibitions freely while having a beer and watching the beautiful sunset across the River Clyde having fun with people I’d met just two days previously.
My favourite memory – successfully running the world’s server supply at the Glasgow Science Centre. You’ve never seen four adults so excited to get the top score in a children’s science experiment. From left to right – Annie Nye, Katie Woodhouse-Skinner, Isobel Eddyshaw, Rachel Branson. (Photo by Simon Williams)
When I applied for my bursary, it was based on a project I was working on over 2023/2024. I had been seconded to a role relating to student publishing and the university's Open Access journal platform and was keen to attend sessions on this theme. Sadly, my secondment has since finished but UKSG was a nice way to celebrate it coming to an end.
“Developing Scottish Universities Press: a practical guide to library-led publishing” delivered by Gillian Daly and Dominique Walker was a great overview of a relatively new initiative across eighteen different Scottish institutions, in response to the changing Open Access landscape and development of new policy requirements for university research staff. I really enjoyed hearing about their collaboration across institutions and the equitable model of subscription (smaller institutions pay less, but still get the same benefits). Their model felt achievable on a small scale; however, I think the strength of having a giant like Edinburgh University Press involved was a real benefit for the development, sustainability and professionalism of this sort of project.
Similarly, I attended a breakout session on Wednesday morning, led by Cath Dishman from Liverpool John Moores University, all about Diamond Open Access publishing models in university libraries. I was especially excited to hear from her in the wider context of library publishing services and learn more about how her institution runs it successfully. I was reassured to find that the steps outlined were things that I had either started doing, or had already done - such as utilising shared resources, training courses and documents that other institutions have previously developed. As good Open Access practitioners, they are normally available under a CC BY Licence so using these is encouraged as long as you credit them properly!
Sessions on critical topics like AI, research retraction, predatory publishing, Transitional Agreements (TAs), and Green Open Access (OA) proved particularly relevant to my role in university Scholarly Communications. The Monday plenary session, delivered by Caren Milloy (Jisc) and Chris Banks (Imperial College London), offered was particularly insightful. They discussed a decrease in Green OA submissions since the introduction of TAs, suggesting authors are publishing final versions Open Access through Jisc-negotiated hybrid journals. However, with approximately 40% of UK research still behind paywalls, significant work remains. I left this session considering how we can better promote TAs within our institution to maximize Open Access research publication, and considering how Green OA will look within the context of the upcoming REF2029.
A selection of freebies from various publishers. The cliché of librarians liking cardigans and cats needs updating – we like tote bags! (Photo by Rachel Branson)
I was initially extremely intimidated by the exhibition hall. I am not a natural at starting conversations with people, so was grateful when some colleagues I had met at an online conference from the Universities of York and Durham took me under their wing. While my role is not based in the development of the collection of my Library, I really enjoyed seeing what publishers had to offer, and took lots of flyers and freebies from the stalls, which I passed on to relevant teams when I returned to the office. On a professional level, I really loved meeting the representatives from Copim, as I really love the notion of radical publishing and Open metadata. I spoke at length with Frontiers about their “journal for kids” Frontiers for Young Minds, I just think this is a great initiative and such an interesting way to get young audiences engaged with scientific ideas, and for academics to consider redeveloping their work in conjunction with child peer reviewers. On a personal level, I spent at least half an hour speaking with Rocks Backpages because I am a huge fan of music, music journalism, and music magazines – I may have ended up getting an invite to visit their office in London to see their archive and whether it rivals my own(!)
It can sometimes feel like you are fighting a losing battle working in Scholarly Communications as it is an ever-changing field. Trying to keep up with day-to-day admin, delivering training and development for researchers, advising and administrating agreements and funds for Open Access monographs, chapters, and articles, as well as the workload of promoting and administering Open Research practices, REF, and other external policies. It was reassuring to meet so many people in similar situations to my own institution. Grace O’Brien and Ruth O’Hara from Maynooth University delivered a breakout session about this exact situation, from the context of their extremely small team – which made me feel extremely lucky with my 8-person dedicated Scholarly Communications team! They discussed the importance of engaging with their stakeholders as much as possible, utilising email templates and LibGuides, and creating their own internal tools to manage workflows. I offered my thanks for them for delivering the session in such an honest way.
When I wrote my bursary application, I stated that my primary goals for attending the conference were to meet colleagues from across the sector, to enhance my overall knowledge, and gain confidence generally. I hoped that the experience would help inform future professional development and assist in career opportunities. I can happily say that I achieved all of this by attending UKSG – it was an invaluable experience both professionally and personally. I’d never been to anything like UKSG before and was a little nervous at first, but everyone was so kind, chatty, and helpful, the food was great, and I feel like a better person for having dared do it! 2025’s conference is due to be held in Brighton and I’m desperately trying to convince my team that we should submit a paper so we can all go!