Open education and educational resources
Objective of the policy
Creating, using and joint development of open educational resources and other open educational practices are part of daily work in higher education and enable continuous learning.
Introduction
This policy applies to open education, open access to educational resources and open educational practices. Research and education have always been closely linked. Research reveals new knowledge that is disseminated more widely to people and that is learned as part of an individual’s own skills. This is why openness in science and research is inherently linked to openness in education. In order for the general public to genuinely be able to utilise research results that have been made open, the results often need to be processed into a form that serves and facilitates the exploitation, dissemination and learning of the results. The open availability of materials developed for needs of education, i.e. educational resources, thus serves to raise awareness of research results. Open educational resources and new types of more open educational practices, for example, those offered by digitalisation, reduce the need to tie education, learning and teaching to a specific time and place. In this way open education becomes a natural part of a new type of flexible education, in which everyone, regardless of their situation in life and place of residence, has more opportunities to learn new things. The policy is the result of collaboration within the Finnish university and research community, constituting a shared view of the direction that the openness of education and educational resources should take.
Freedom of the teacher and the researcher
The aim of the policy is to achieve openness in a way that supports and increases the freedom and opportunities of teachers and researchers to share researched information in their teaching and in the educational resources they have prepared. The purpose of educational resources is to distribute research based information to society as a whole. Teachers and researchers must be able to choose the best methods for this purpose in their teaching and educational resources. The higher education and research community must guarantee incentives and structures for the open education and educational resources in a way that respects, on an equal basis, the work done by teachers and researchers to develop education and educational resources.
International and national framework
This policy has been prepared using the extensive domestic and international work that has been done to improve open education and educational resources. Important international sources for drafting the policy have been the European Commission publication Practical Guidelines on Open Education for Academics: modernising higher education via open educational practices (2019) and the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Educational Resources (OER, 2019). Significant national achievements include the national Library of Open Educational Resources1 developed by the Ministry of Education and the Finnish National Agency for Education and coordinated by CSC, and ARENE’s and UNIFI’s shared vision for the digitalisation of higher education institutions2.
Risks and threats
Even though open educational resources and other openly accessible education are available to their users for free, a wide range of resources are required for their creation and other development. There is a risk that costs and workloads will accumulate among those individuals and organisations that are particularly active in opening up education and educational resources. The higher education and research community should consider sharing the costs and workloads arising from opening up education and educational resources and take care of their necessary resourcing. There is also a risk that authors will be forced to open up education and educational resources. To prevent this risk, a national recommendation highlighting the author’s decision making power has been drawn up. The obligation to open all types of education and all types of educational resources is not even justified, as some of the education and educational resources may not work well outside a particular teaching situation. Instead of imposing an obligation, the best way to open up education is by encouraging, for example, giving recognition and merits for opening up education and educational resources. Another kind of threat can arise from the belief that open educational resources and other openly accessible education could alone form the foundation for learning and education and replace interactive classroom study. Classroom study must not be forgotten when promoting open education, and the overall quality of education should be monitored regularly. In addition, the opportunities provided by open education and open educational resources should be utilised to improve the quality of learning and teaching. The learned societies and other domestic scholarly publishers share the concern that open access to educational resources will have an adverse impact on their financial operational preconditions. However, high quality popular research-based publications that are written and edited for special areas have a place alongside open educational resources. Open educational resources can also create markets for various value-added services. There are also concerns regarding financial operational preconditions in universities offering commercial education and education export. Since the policy does not require the openness of all education, higher education institutions will have the opportunity to commercialise the education. In addition, open educational resources and other openly accessible education offer opportunities for marketing. High-quality open educational resources or online courses can be a sign of a high-quality educational player and so attract learners to also benefit from commercial products and services.
Structure and background of the policy
The policy has been prepared by the Finnish higher education and research community. A working group commissioned separately by the Expert Panel in Open Education under the Open Science Coordination of the Federation of Finnish Learned Societies (TSV) has been responsible for ensuring the progress of the work. The work has been guided by the Finnish National Open Science and Research Steering Group. The policy supports the Declaration for Open Science and Research 2020–2025.3 The policy is composed of joint principles and policy components of (a) open access to educational resources and (b) open educational practices that determine objectives and actions. The principles define the general terms and conditions for promoting open education and educational resources. They consist of important principles for the higher education and research community that must be adhered to in the promotion of openness. The objectives recorded in the policy components are more time-dependent goals that involve concrete actions. A changing international environment will impact the objectives and the actions they involve sooner than it will impact the principles.
Implementation and follow-up
The policy is applied in higher education and in various forms of continuous learning in which the organisations of the higher education and research community participate, for example, as organisers or partners. This policy can also be used, where appropriate, for the planning of the practices of open education and open educational resources of other educational organisations. The policy will take effect step by step from 1 January 2021 onwards. The details of the policy are specified in the recommendations, of which by 31 May 2022 have been published the following:
- Recommendation on the copyright issues to be taken into consideration in the open publication of educational resources
- Quality criteria for open education. Part 1. The quality criteria for open educational resources
- Guidelines on accessibility of open educational resources,
- Recommendation on gaining merit in open education and open educational resources
- Competence requirements for open education
Monitoring of the implementation of the policy is the responsibility of Open Science Coordination, which also annually determines, using the expertise of the Expert Panel in Open Education, the appropriate target levels for the follow-up. The policy will be updated in 2024.
Definitions
Open education: Opening up education or Open Education means extending access to and participation in education to larger audiences and target groups by lowering barriers to education and increasing accessibility, unrestrictedness, offering and learner-centeredness. It diversifies the possibilities of teaching, learning and building, joint development and sharing of knowledge and combines the pathways of formal and nonformal learning. Although open education is often carried out using digital technologies, open education is not the same as digital education or digitalisation of educational resources.
Open educational resources: Open educational resources mean materials or information in any form and used on any medium, partly designed for teaching and learning purposes, which have been:
- released for public use (public domain) or;
- shared by an open licence that permits no-cost access, reuse, repurpose, adaptation and redistribution by others.
In addition, when calculating the amount of open educational resources, the calculations shall also take into account the educational resources prepared prior to the entry into force of the policy, which have been licensed by partially open licences prohibiting the publication of versions modified based on the resources, the commercial use of the resources, or both (for example Creative Commons licences including ND or NC conditions). Although scholarly publications can be used as educational resources, especially at higher education levels, and although openness of scholarly publications therefore makes these open as educational resources as well, this policy applies, above all, to educational resources which are not primarily scholarly publications. In addition, according to the policy, open educational resource must be a pedagogically meaningful whole that can be utilised in education.
The definition of open educational resources is in line with the definition of open educational resources given in the UNESCO Recommendation on Educational Resources 2019, except that the reference to research materials has been omitted, because these will be discussed in the Policy of open access to research materials and methods.
Open educational practices: Open educational practices mean practices by which education, learning and teaching are made transparent and shared and which enable their further processing. Such practices include:
- peer learning and the development of education between students, researchers, teaching staff and the rest of the society;
- involving students in the planning of their learning pathways, including the identification and recognition of competences acquired outside their own educational establishment;
- opening up the education offering to the general public (e.g. MOOC courses);
- sharing and reuse of information relating to the planning and organising of teaching (e.g. curricula, evaluation methods, guidelines, experiences from the implementation of teaching and from learning);
- use, further development and joint development of open educational resources (e.g. videos, podcasts, written material)
The Finnish higher education and research community: The Finnish higher education and research community consists partly of the same players as the Finnish research community <a href="#cite_note-1">[1]</a>, defined in the Declaration for Open Science and Research, but in particular from the viewpoint of education. More specifically, the Finnish higher education and research community comprises:
* universities and universities of applied sciences as defined in Finnish laws and regulations;
* teaching and research personnel at Finnish universities and universities of applied sciences, and service personnel supporting teaching and research;
* students at Finnish universities and universities of applied sciences, especially when they participate in the development of education and educational resources;
* Finnish service providers developing open higher education and open research infrastructure, such as CSC – IT Center for Science Ltd;
* other players and organisations that form the Finnish research community (for example research institutions, learned societies and libraries), especially when they work with education and educational resources and participate in the development of open education; in this policy they are referred to as other organisations developing open education
Learner: For the purposes of the policies for open science and research, learner means a person who participates in education organised by a Finnish higher education institution or is applying or has applied for this in different ways at different stages of life or otherwise utilises the learning opportunities offered by Finnish higher education institutions. Learners include graduate students from Finnish universities, though the learner is not necessarily a graduate student
Competence requirements for open education: The National recommendation on competence requirements for open education defines the knowledge and skills required for competence in open education. The competence requirements form a three-step, cumulative scale:
- the user of open educational resources understands the basic concepts of open education and is able to place them in the wider field of open science and research, understands the rights and obligations that copyright law imposes on the user of educational resources, knows how to find and use open educational resources and other materials in their teaching respecting the copyrights and licence clauses as well as knows how to assess the quality of open educational resources,
- the author of open educational resources understands the rights and obligations that copyright law imposes on the author of educational resources, knows how to prepare, publish and describe open educational resources, understands the data protection and information security issues related to open educational resources and is able to demonstrate merit in the preparation of open educational resources,
- the open education influencer is familiar with open educational practices, knows how to cocreate open educational resources and open online courses and is familiar with networking and merit practices in open education.
Sharing competence related to the planning and organisatin of teaching: Teachers have a wide range of competence in planning and organising teaching. Some of this may be explicit information expressed in writing, such as plans for the progress of the study unit being taught or the methods to be used. Some, on the other hand, may be more implicit competence, such as experiences about the implementation of teaching. This competence can be shared with others in many ways, at best also across organisational boundaries. Written or other materials can be shared directly with other teachers, while more implicit knowledge can be shared, for example, in presentation sessions or as informal peer tutoring and mentoring.
Recognition of prior learning: Recognition of prior learning means a measure in which the learner’s competence that meets the criteria for the degree to be completed, the criteria for the education to be completed or the degree qualification requirements but has been acquired and demonstrated in another context and has been verified is included in the degree. The recognition of prior learning is usually preceded by the identification of prior learning in which the education provider identifies the learner’s competence and other preconditions in relation to the requirements and goals on the basis of the documents and other possible accounts presented by the learner. Together, the identification and recognition of prior learning constitute a measure similar to the accreditation of prior learning though the competence to be identified and recognised may also be something else than completed study units.
Involvement in the planning and implementation of open education: Learners can be involved in the planning and implementation of open education at many levels. First of all, an individual learner can plan their open education by tailoring education for them from different study units. In addition, learners can be more generally involved in the planning of various study units utilised in open education, e.g., through surveys or workshops. Developing study units through feedback from learners is also one way of involving learners in the planning and implementation of open education.
Product of learning: A product of learning is the material created as a result of learning, such as a blog post, video or report.
Sharing materials related to teaching and evaluation: The sharing of materials related to the teaching and assessment means, for example, the open sharing of curricula and assessment methods as well as guidelines and experiences related to learning and the implementation of teaching.
MyData: MyData refers to a people-centred approach to managing person-related information. MyData aims to enable individuals to continue to use and manage the (continued) use of their personal data in an interoperable, machine-readable and clear manner. MyData can also refer to a subset of personal data in which the above features are realised. MyData’s principles involve peoplecentred management of personal data, the individual as the “integration point” – that is, the enabler of the information flow, the individual’s empowerment, transferability of data, transparency and responsibility, and interoperability. These principles, written out in the MyData declaration can be used to examine the degree of implementation of MyData.
Teaching open to everyone: In terms of openness, teaching is a continuum, with teaching open to everyone free of charge at one end and teaching for a limited group (e.g., for graduate students) at the other. In practice, it may be difficult to classify different teaching situations at or between either end; otherwise, open teaching may have to limit, for example, the awarding of study attainments due to the lack of resources, while it may also be possible for others to follow teaching aimed primarily at graduate students, for example. This policy defines open teaching available to everyone as all education that is widely available and in which anyone can participate free of charge. There may be a fee for providing a study attainment for teaching open to everyone. Teaching open to everyone can take the form of contact teaching, distance teaching or hybrid teaching through a variety of open online courses, for example.
Open badges: Open badges are created and awarded to identify and recognise competence, skills and achievements. Open badges are often associated with making nonformal learning visible. Open badges aim to identify and recognise, for example, what we learn at work, in our hobbies or in various positions of trust. They are seen as a means of supporting lifelong learning and employment and are aimed at preventing social exclusion.
The original idea of open badges is not only to make nonformal learning visible, but also to better identify competences when, in addition to organisations, individuals and communities can identify and recognise their own or each other’s competence, skills and achievements.
From a technical point of view, an open badge is an image that contains metadata. Metadata indicates who has granted the badge to whom, what the badge recognises and stands for and the criteria on which it is based. Metadata follows the Open Badge standard, which can be used to verify whether the badge is genuine and valid.
Learning analytics: Learning analytics refers to the collection, measurement, analysis and reporting of information on the learner and the learning process in order to understand and develop learning and learning environments. Learning analytics collects, measures, analyses and reports data from studies, and technical functionalities are built into the latest learning platforms. Learning analytics is based on the students’ digital traces (link in Finnish) that they leave in the systems used during their studies.
Educational data: Educational data refers to information accumulated on different platforms during the process of education.
Strategic principles and the responsibilities for their fulfilment
Principle 1: Quality
When evaluating education and open educational resources developed with it, the reliability of their content and other elements defining their quality are considered in addition to their openness.
Ensuring the realisation and monitoring of the principle:
- Review of the initial situation: Review of the initial situation: In 2021, Open Science Coordination will determine how the general quality criteria for education and educational resources can be applied to open education and open educational resources, and what other quality criteria are needed.
- Continuous monitoring: Continuous monitoring: In addition to monitoring the criteria, universities and universities of applied sciences ensure in their own quality systems that investments in creating and using open educational resources and other openly accessible education increase the overall quality of education. The universities ensure that high quality contact teaching is provided, even though open educational resources and education are extensively available.
Principle 2: Copyright
In the development and utilisation of open education and open educational resources copyright, data protection and ethical practices are respected.
Ensuring the realisation and monitoring of the principle:
- Review of the initial situation: Review of the initial situation: In 2020, Open Science Coordination will assess which contractual and copyright, data protection and licensing issues must be taken into consideration when opening educational resources.
- Continuous monitoring: Continuous monitoring: In addition to monitoring the criteria, in 2021, Open Science Coordination will launch a study on the intellectual property rights (including the educational resources prepared on the basis of these) of research outputs in order to clarify ownership and contractual issues. The report will utilise the expertise of universities and employee organisations in the field of research and education.
Principle 3: Diversity of learners
The development of open education and open educational resources takes into account their accessibility and applicability to a diversity of learners.
Ensuring the realisation and monitoring of the principle:
- Review of the initial situation: Review of the initial situation: In 2021, Open Science Coordination will identify the criteria for the accessibility of educational resources. By 2022, the criteria for observing the diversity of learners and the responsibility of content in open education and educational resources will be identified.
- Continuous monitoring: Continuous monitoring: As part of the national monitoring of open science.
Principle 4: Merit
Work for developing open education and educational resources is evaluated in the merit criteria and in the planning of duties.
Ensuring the realisation and monitoring of the principle:
- Review of the initial situation: Review of the initial situation: In 2021, Open Science Coordination will identify the best practices, how the development of open education and educational resources will be taken into consideration in duties and how they will be given merits. In addition, Open Science Coordination plans, together with CSC, universities and other organisations developing open education, the indicators and knowledge base to support the evaluation of merits.
- Continuous monitoring: Continuous monitoring: As part of the national monitoring of open science.
Policy component 1: Open access to educational resources
Objective 1: Use and creation of Open Educational Resources
By 2025 open educational resources are used and created extensively in universities.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
- FAIR-recommendation for Open Educational Resources. By 2022, Open Science Coordination will, in cooperation with universities and other organisations developing open education, draft a joint recommendation on the practices and tools that ensure the findability, interoperability, reusability and further development of open educational resources.
- Open online course. By 2022, Open Science Coordination will explore the possibility of establishing, in cooperation with CSC, an open online course, which, once completed, will give the participant the preparedness needed for the creation and utilisation of open educational resources
- Competence requirements. By 2023, Open Science Coordination will, together with universities and other organisations developing open education, determine the competence requirements for open educational resources, which will indicate the skills that teachers should be in possession of when creating and utilising open educational resources.
- Guidelines. On the basis of this policy and the recommendations that specify it, universities and other organisations developing open education, will draw up their own guidelines on open educational resources, which will provide advice on, for example, matters such as contracts, licences, tools for opening educational resources, recommended distribution locations and finding and using of open educational resources.
- Support and training. Universities and other organisations developing open education will provide support and training to creators of open educational resources on licensing and openness and issues related to its practical implementation.
- Monitoring. As part of the national monitoring of open science, the capacity of organisations to support the development of open educational resources will be investigated on a regular basis.
Objective 2: Quantity and quality of Open Educational Resources
By 2025 the amount of open educational resources in higher education has multiplied and the quality has improved to better serve education.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
- Prize. By 2021, Open Science Coordination will develop a prize, which will be distributed annually to a person or group for outstanding merits in developing open education and educational resources.
- Funding mechanisms. By 2023, Open Science Coordination will study the funding mechanisms for the development of open educational resources by also investigating international examples for comparison.
- Metadata. The authors of open educational resources are recommended to provide metadata of the open educational resources they have created for the Library of Open Educational Resources.
- Interfaces. Universities and other organisations developing open education are seeking for methods with the Library of Open Educational Resources by which open educational resources stored in their own repositories will also be stored in the Library of Open Educational Resources.
- Cost model. By 2023, universities and key funders, with the assistance of UNIFI and ARENE, will agree on how to share the costs of promoting open access to educational resources and, in accordance with the agreed model, support the preparation and updating of open educational resources.
- Research funding. Providers of research funding will provide positive consideration to open educational resources drawn up on the basis of research results in funding decisions.
- Cooperation. Universities and other organisations developing open education plan and implement joint projects that promote the capacity of all participants in the project to develop open educational resources, jointly develop highquality open educational resources and establish networks for the marketing of open educational resources.
- Other levels of education. Universities and other organisations developing open education plan and implement cooperation projects for using open educational resources from higher education in other levels of education.
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Monitoring. As part of the monitoring of open science, a process to assess the quality and quantity of open educational resources in higher education will be created and introduced.
- i) The Library of Open Educational Resources collects information on an annual basis on how many higher education educational resources have metadata stored in the Library and how many have been downloaded from it in different fields and in different languages.
- ii) The Library of Open Educational Resources collects information on the updating and accessibility of higher education educational resources stored there.
Objective 3: Recognition
By 2025 Finland is known as a pioneer and promoter of open educational resources in higher education.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
- Use and valuation at the EU level. The Finnish university and research community participates in promoting and researching the use and valuation of open educational resources at the EU level.
- Communication. Open Science Coordination provides information on open educational resources, the related policy and joint recommendations, and services and projects related to open education both in Finland and internationally.
- Dissemination of information. Universities and other organisations developing open education disseminate information on open educational resources and related practices within the organisation and to their partners and wider audience at both national and international level.
- International cooperation. Finnish universities and other organisations that develop open education, as well as Open Science Coordination, participate in international cooperation projects, especially in the EU, the objective of which is to promote the development and use of open educational resources.
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Research. By 2023, Open Science Coordination, together with universities, providers of research funding and other organisations developing open education, will explore possibilities for a research project to study the quality, quantity, use and valuation of open educational resources at universities in European Union countries.
- i) The research project will identify and create methods that will enable a fair assessment of the use and valuation of open educational resources published in different countries and in different languages
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Policy component 2: Open educational practices
Objective 1: Support from higher education institutions
By 2025, higher education institutions will make use of open educational practices and support cooperation, communality and sharing in education.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
- Administration, quality work and incentive systems. By 2024, higher education institutions will have their own policy that steers the administration of open education, quality work and the personnel’s merit and incentive systems so that they support open educational practices.
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Openness in services. From 2024 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will promote openness in the organisation of services that support education, for instance, by the use of open data, open learning and collaboration platforms and open source software, as well as by promoting transparency in service procurement.
- i) The teaching, IT management and library networks of higher education institutions will work together to promote the interoperability of open learning and collabortion platforms used in teaching as well as that of open education services.
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Expertise in open educational practices. From 2024 onwards at the latest, the higher education and research community will develop expertise in open educational practices.
- i) The Open Science and Research Coordination, in cooperation with higher education institutions and other organisations promoting open education, creates a network of experts in open educational practices.
- ii) The higher education and research community establishes competence requirements for open education as part of teacher training.
- iii) Higher education institutions enable their personnel to develop their skills in open educational practices.
- Sharing of expertise. From 2024 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will encourage their personnel to share their expertise in planning and organising teaching.
Objective 2: Support for learners
2: By 2025, learners will be provided with opportunities and support for open education.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
- Recognising competence. Higher education institutions have diverse ways of recognising competence gained through open education.
- Availability and accessibility. Higher education institutions provide means and support to improve the availability and accessibility of education.
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Involvement of learners. Higher education institutions involve learners in the planning and implementation of open education.
- i) From 2024 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will have practices in place to involve learners in the planning and implementation.
- Skills in open science and education,. From 2023 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will support learners’ skills in themes related to open science and education, such as licensing practices and copyright.
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Open sharing of products of learning. From 2025 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will encourage learners to share the products of their learning openly and to make use of materials opened by other learners, applying the quality criteria for open education.
- i) Higher education institutions promote a voluntary open sharing and cooperation culture for learners by highlighting the opportunities for cooperation, peer development and use offered by open sharing and by informing them about the risks of open sharing.
- ii) From 2023 onwards, higher education institutions, together with the Open Science and Research Coordination, will increase teachers’ understanding of the conditions imposed by copyright for the open sharing of materials produced by learners.
- iii )By 2024, higher education institutions will have developed guidelines and operating models for the open sharing of products of learning.
- iv) From 2024 onwards, the monitoring of open science will take into account how information is available to learners about the open sharing of their products of learning.
- Teaching and evaluation related materials. From 2024 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will encourage teachers to openly share teaching and evaluation related materials with learners.
- MyData. By 2024, in higher education institutions will begin to plan in the Digivision 2030 project how learners can utilise information related to their learning in accordance with the MyData principles.
Objective 3: Societal interaction
By 2025, open education will be a significant part of the societal interaction of the higher education and research community.
Actions required to achieve the objective:
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Teaching that is open to everyone. Higher education institutions provide more teaching that is open to everyone.
- i) Higher education institutions clarify and communicate how to participate in teaching open to everyone, including contact teaching.
- ii) From 2024 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will develop platforms and services that enable the digital opening of teaching.
- iii)From 2023 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions will cooperate nationally and internationally in the development and implementation of teaching open to everyone.
- iv) From 2024 onwards, the monitoring of open science will take into account teaching open to everyone and participation in it.
- Open badges. Higher education institutions grant open badges in accordance with the standards or other credits for the open education accomplishments.
- Scientific communication and science education. Higher education institutions and other organisations promoting open education cooperate in implementing scientific communicationEducation-footnote-4 and science educationEducation-footnote-5 in accordance with the recommendations of the Committee for Public Information and the Federation of Finnish Learned Societies.
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Educational data. From 2023 onwards at the latest, higher education institutions plan the open sharing of educational data in accordance with responsible data management practices.
- i) By 2023, higher education institutions will agree in the Digivision 2030 project on the best practices for opening educational data.
- ii) By 2024, higher education institutions will begin in the Digivision 2030 project to design services to enable the opening of educational data.
- Cooperation and research. Higher education institutions and other organisations promoting open education cooperate nationally and internationally in the development of and research into open education.
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Open education and educational resources, Open education and educational resources, open access to scholarly publications. National policy and executive plan by the higher education and research community for 2021–2025: Policy component for open access to theses
Open Access to Theses
The Declaration for Open Science and Research states that "In the research community, responsible openness is a part of everyday research throughout the research process, and research organisations have assessment practices, incentives, and services in place to support this." 4 This also applies to the thesis process, and this policy component on open access to theses applies to all theses completed in higher education institutions (bachelor’s and master’s theses at universities and universities of applied sciences, advanced studies theses, licentiate theses, and doctoral theses). Open science enables a broader use of research results by the research community and society, thus increasing the impact of research as well as the level of scholarship and innovation in society. Openness and the transparency of the process are also intended to support the quality of research. In the context of universities of applied sciences, a thesis is a task that requires and demonstrates expertise and takes into account aspects of the challenges of working life, thus making openness particularly useful from a professional point of view. The policy component on open access to theses has been developed to serve these basic objectives from the perspective of theses.A thesis written in a public educational institution is, in principle, a public document 5 A thesis being a public document means that the metadata of the thesis are available, and the thesis is accessible directly or upon request. According to a 2019 decision by the Administrative Court of Northern Finland, copyright law does not limit the disclosure of information about a public document, and the author's consent is not required for disclosure 6 All theses are public, but in addition to publicity, efforts and skills are needed to promote openness, both in terms of publications and education. Openness is a core value of science and research, and a part of responsible research and teaching.
The of immediate open access is to raise the quality of science and research and to increase their societal impact and visibility 7 According to a Ministry of Education and Culture's guideline 8, universities and universities of applied sciences must ensure that their theses do not contain confidential material and that they are made public as soon as they are approved. If the research material of a thesis contains confidential material, it should be placed in the background/annex material rather than the publicly accessible part of the thesis. The Publicity Act defines what information should be kept secret 9. The National Defence University and the Police University College may, if necessary, deviate from the thesis publicity requirement on the grounds of security classification. Open access to a thesis means making the work available online free of charge. In some subjects, there may also be parts of a thesis, such as events or artwork, which cannot be made open. In practice, it is mainly the archivable part of the thesis that can be opened. Openness and the degree of openness are the thesis author’s choice, but organisations and supervisors must ensure that every thesis author has the option to be open and to determine the degree of openness, for instance by providing the infrastructure and guidance to enable openness.In principle, theses are not considered publications, but doctoral theses are also research publications. Similarly, articles that are included in theses are publications, to which the policy on open access to scholarly publications applies. Theses and dissertations are usually made openly available in a repository (e.g. Theseus, institutional repository).
Responsible Opening of Theses
Higher education institutions are responsible for providing thesis supervisors and authors with support and guidance in opening theses responsibly. An essential part of this support and guidance is to provide advice on the laws (e.g. General Data Protection Regulation, The Copyright Act) and principles of good scientific practice to be followed when making a thesis public and possibly open access. It is also important to advise, for example, that when publishing and opening theses, one must respect the copyright of third parties, especially concerning the use of images, and that the privacy of research subjects should be respected. Higher education institutions must ensure that thesis supervisors and authors have sufficient support and guidance to meet accessibility requirements for all theses. The minimum digital accessibility requirements are defined in the Act on the Provision of Digital Services and the accessibility of theses is also required in the third principle of the National Policy on Open Education and Educational Resources.
The necessary support includes, for example, templates for the production of accessible theses. Higher education institutions should also provide support and guidance on choosing the appropriate license if the author decides to make their thesis open access. As a general rule, Creative Commons (CC) licences should be favoured, as they are widely used and provide the reader with clear information on how to use the thesis. When opening the metadata of a thesis, it is usually best to use a CC0 licence, which allows the metadata to be easily distributed from one system to another. It is the responsibility of the thesis supervisor to guide the author on responsible opening of the thesis with the help of the university's guidelines and support. Ultimately, it is the responsibility of the thesis author to follow the provided guidance.
Merits and Other Benefit of Opening a Thesis
An openly accessible thesis reaches a wider audience, and openness increases its impact as other students and researchers can benefit from the work already done. The merits of open science, such as making data, methods, and publications openly accessible, should be more widely recognised, and national and international recommendations do aim to reduce the weight of citations in various research and researcher evaluations 10 An open thesis will also find a readership outside the scientific and research community, and it can be used as a portfolio and demonstration of skills at the beginning of a career. Both companies and specialist organisations can use the results for practical solutions and development work. As societal impact is an important part of the academic merit system, further use of the thesis outside the research world will also benefit the author. From the perspective of higher education institutions, open theses are a reflection of the knowledge produced by the education and training institutions and the effectiveness and quality of their activities 11 The degree of openness of a thesis is always the choice of the thesis author, taking into account potential partners as well as legislation. Therefore, the thesis supervisor will not directly gain merit from making a thesis open access.
Glossary
Accessibility: Digital accessibility means supporting equality and inclusion, i.e. 'that as many people as possible can use online services as easily as possible. It also means that accessibility has been taken into account in the planning and implementation of the services' (Open Science and Research Coordination in Finland 2021, 9). Accessibility is mandatory for public documents such as theses and open educational resources, among others. Accessibility involves good technical implementation, ease of use, and comprehensibility of content (Open Science and Research Coordination in Finland 2021, 9–10).
Accompanying material: Information or materials related to the thesis assignment that should be kept confidential.
Archivability: The archivable part of a thesis includes any part of the thesis where the publication format allows for long-term preservation. In some disciplines, there may also be parts of a thesis, such as events or artistic works, which are not archivable.
Article processing charge: A fee that may be charged by the publisher of an open access journal to the author or their organisation. Article processing charges may be charged by fully open access journals (so-called "gold standard" journals) or by "hybrid" journals, where only part of the content is open access. (The Helsinki Term Bank For the Arts and Sciences)
Availability: Availability refers to the accessibility of information in, for example, a public document. This means that the information in the document can be used at the desired time and in the required manner. An accessible document may, for example, be openly accessible or available on request.
Business collaboration: Business collaboration refers to collaboration between research organisations and companies for consideration or free of charge, which may vary from informal interaction to organised collaboration. Forms of collaboration include contract research, commissioned research, training and consulting. The collaboration can be funded by a public or private sector organisation.
Creative Commons: Creative Commons, the world's most common open licensing system, was created in 2001. It is the preferred licence for open source material in many countries. Creative Commons licences are designed to be easy to use and understand. It is up to the author to decide on the licence according to their own objectives. In principle, a CC licence includes an irrevocable worldwide right to redistribute the material. By choosing the appropriate additional conditions from a list of four, the author can limit these rights as they see fit. Read more: https://creativecommons.org/
Data Management Plan: Data Management Plan (DMP) is a formal and dynamic document that specifies how resources are managed across the life cycle of a thesis, covering, for instance, research data, analysis steps (e.g. protocols, algorithms, procedures), devices and tools (e.g. information on lab equipment and manufacturers, reagents, infrastructure, software), other relevant documentation, versioning, preservation, services, terms and conditions, and open development and sharing of research data, methods and infrastructures. (Open Science and Research Coordination in Finland, Federation of Finnish Learned Societies 2023, 34)
Embargo: A restriction under which material can be freely used only after a set waiting period, for example once a publication has been released.
FAIR principles: FAIR principles are a set of guidelines to make research data Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable. This facilitates scientific discovery and access to knowledge. (Open Science and Research Coordination in Finland 2023, 34.)
Institutional repository: Institutional repository is a technical system for the storage and open online publication of scientific publications and the services built around it. (The Helsinki Term Bank For the Arts and Sciences)
Metadata: Metadata or descriptive information refers to the context, content and structure, management and/or processing of research data and information describing and summarising its compilation.
Open access: The publication in its entirety is available on the Internet free of charge and without restrictions to read, print and copy at least for non-commercial use.
Open licence: A pre-formatted licence, the terms of which must be respected before the material can be used. Openly published material is available to all. If material is to be used publicly, the terms of the licence must be respected. Thus, anyone who uses the work further can comply with the terms of the open licence, which include, for example, attribution of the author and source in a way formulated by the author. The user obtains the rights granted by the licence (such as redistribution and modification rights) by complying with the terms of the licence. (Open Science and Research Coordination in Finland 2020, 2; link in Finnish.)
Opening a thesis: Opening a thesis means that the archivable part of the thesis is made available online free of charge. Making the thesis public means that the metadata of the thesis are available, and the thesis is accessible directly or on request. A public thesis is therefore not necessarily open.
Predatory publication: A journal or other publication that presents itself as scientific but neglects the responsibility of a scientific publisher, for example for peer review, and relies on aggressive marketing and charging fees to authors (The Helsinki Term Bank For the Arts and Sciences).
Public thesis: see Opening a thesis
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| Type | DocumentType:Policy |
|---|---|
| Name (fi) | Oppimisen ja oppimateriaalien sekä tutkimusjulkaisujen avoimuus. Korkeakoulu- ja tutkimusyhteisön kansallinen linjaus ja toimenpideohjelma 2021–2025: Opinnäytetöiden avoimuuden osalinjaus |
| Name (sv) | Öppen utbildning och öppna lärresurser samt öppen tillgång till forskningspubliktioner. Policy och åtgärdsprogram för det finländska högskole- och forskarsamfundet 2021–2025: Delpolicy för öppen tillgång till lärdomsprov |
| Name (en) | Open education and educational resources, open access to scholarly publications. National policy and executive plan by the higher education and research community for 2021–2025: Policy component for open access to theses |
| Description (fi) | Avoimen tieteen ja tutkimuksen julistuksessa todetaan: “Tutkimusyhteisössä vastuullinen avoimuus on osa tutkimuksen arkea läpi koko tutkimusprosessin, ja tutkimusorganisaatioissa on tätä tukevat arviointikäytännöt, kannustimet ja palvelut.” Tämä koskee myös opinnäytetyöprosessia, ja tämä avoimuuden osalinjaus koskee kaikkia korkeakoulujen opinnäytetöitä (tutkintoon johtavat kandidaatintutkielmat, pro gradu -työt, syventävien opintojen opinnäytetyöt, AMK- ja YAMK-opinnäytetyöt, lisensiaatintyöt ja väitöskirjat).
Tutkimuksen avoimuudella mahdollistetaan tutkimustulosten laajempi käyttö tutkimusyhteisössä ja yhteiskunnassa, mikä lisää tutkitun tiedon vaikuttavuutta, sivistystä ja innovaatioita. Avoimuuden ja prosessin läpinäkyvyyden on tarkoitus myös tukea tutkimuksen laatua. Ammattikorkeakoulukontekstissa opinnäytetyö on asiantuntemusta edellyttävä ja osoittava tehtävä, jossa huomioidaan työelämän haasteiden näkökulmat, jolloin avoimuudesta voidaan katsoa olevan hyötyä erityisesti ammatillisesta näkökulmasta. Opinnäytetöiden avoimen saatavuuden osalinjaus on tehty palvelemaan näitä perustavoitteita opinnäytetöiden näkökulmasta. |
| Description (sv) | I Deklarationen för öppen vetenskap och forskning konstateras att "[a]nsvarsfull öppenhet är en del av forskningssamfundets vardag genom hela forskningsprocessen. Forskningsorganisationerna har utvärderingspraxis, incitament och tjänster som stöder öppen vetenskap och forskning." Detta gäller också lärdomsprovsprocessen, och denna delpolicy omfattar alla lärdomsprov som genomförs vid högskolor (kandidatavhandlingar som leder till examen, avhandlingar pro gradu, lärdomsprov för fördjupade studier i medicin, odontologi och veterinärmedicin, examensarbeten för yrkeshögskoleexamen och högre yrkeshögskoleexamen, licentiatavhandlingar samt doktorsavhandlingar).
Öppenhet i forskning möjliggör bredare användning av forskningsresultat i forskningssamfundet och samhället, vilket ökar den forskningsbaserade kunskapens genomslag samt bildning och innovation. Processens öppenhet och transparens ska också främja forskningens kvalitet. Sett ur yrkeshögskolesynvinkel kräver och demonstrerar ett lärdomsprov sakkunskap, och det beaktar också olika aspekter på arbetslivets utmaningar. Därmed kan öppenhet ses som särskilt värdefullt ur ett yrkesperspektiv. Delpolicyn för öppen tillgång till lärdomsprov är utformad för att tillgodose dessa grundläggande mål ur lärdomsprovens perspektiv. |
| Description (en) | The Declaration for Open Science and Research states that "In the research community, responsible openness is a part of everyday research throughout the research process, and research organisations have assessment practices, incentives, and services in place to support this." This also applies to the thesis process, and this policy component on open access to theses applies to all theses completed in higher education institutions (bachelor’s and master’s theses at universities and universities of applied sciences, advanced studies theses, licentiate theses, and doctoral theses).
Open science enables a broader use of research results by the research community and society, thus increasing the impact of research as well as the level of scholarship and innovation in society. Openness and the transparency of the process are also intended to support the quality of research. In the context of universities of applied sciences, a thesis is a task that requires and demonstrates expertise and takes into account aspects of the challenges of working life, thus making openness particularly useful from a professional point of view. The policy component on open access to theses has been developed to serve these basic objectives from the perspective of theses. |
| Field | Domain:ScholarlyPublications |
| Validity start | 2020 |
| Validity End | 2025 |
| Tags | |
| Has part | Opinnäytetyöt/Section 1 |
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Annex 1: Timeline of the actions
Annex 2: Drafting of the policy
The policy has been drafted by a working group gathered up by the Expert panel in Open Education. The members of the working group are:
- Kaisu Clarot University of Oulu
- Minna Fred Laurea University of Applied Sciences
- Susanna Hasiwar University of Oulu
- Janniina Heinonen The Trade Union of Education in Finland OAJ
- Aino Helariutta Laurea University of Applied Sciences
- Ira Hietanen-Tanskanen The Trade Union of Education in Finland OAJ
- Ilmari Jauhiainen The Federation of Finnish Learned Societies
- Joni Kajander National Union of University Students in Finland
- Anne Kärki Satakunta University of Applied Sciences
- Leo Lahti University of Turku
- Anna Lindfors CSC
- Jouni Markkula University of Oulu
- Paula Merikko Finnish National Board of Education
- Minna Niemi-Grundström University of Tampere
- Seliina Päällysaho Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences
- Maria Rehbinder Aalto University
- Jarkko Toikkanen University of Oulu / The Finnish Union of University Researchers and Teachers
- Tarmo Toikkanen Open Knowledge Finland / Creative Commons Finland / The Association of Finnish eLearning Centre / IT instructors
- Tarjaleena Tuukkanen Häme University of Applied Sciences
- Marjo Vallittu University of Jyväskylä
- Salla Viitanen The Finnish Union of University Researchers and Teachers
- Terhi Kaipainen South-Eastern Finland University of Applied Sciences
- Miki Kallio University of Oulu
The policy was drafted on the basis of an open preliminary survey aimed especially at university teachers, in which teachers’ experiences on open educational resources and their wishes and fears concerning the future policy were evaluated. 108 replies were received. The Policy Group has strived to comply with the following values in its policy work:
- Humanity – the aim in the policy has been to adapt the structures to the needs of learners and teachers, not the learners and teachers to the structures
- Sense of community – efforts have been made to involve all relevant stakeholders, such as teachers, learners and organisations, in the policy work
- Diversity – the policy aims to enable many ways of implementing open education.
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