Latin American Open Access Essay Competition 2020 “Open with Purpose: Taking Actions to Build Structural Equity and Inclusion”

The Open Access Week is an “annual academic communication event on Open Access issues and is an opportunity to reflect on past progress, strengthen multifactorial processes and to plan strategies for the future”. UNESCO along with its partners, wishes to take advantage of the Open Access Week 2020 to collaborate with the academic world, to explore new changes in the publishing processes and the democratization of knowledge. The Open Access Week will be organized in 2020 with the theme: “Open with Purpose”.

Latin America has been a leading continent in Open Access. This has been achieved through setting examples and various cornerstones. Therefore, with the objective of committing the Latin American academy to improve understanding of the subject and generate concrete actions to increase its role on the publication processes, a regional webinar has been organized

“Openness can be a powerful tool that allows to build more equitable systems to share knowledge. Reconstructing research and academic activities so that they are open by default, presents a unique opportunity to build a foundation that is fundamentally more equitable. However today cultural racism, discrimination, and exclusion are present and persist in places where openness is a core value. As a global community it is important to understand that today’s systems and spaces are often built over historical legacies of injustice and addressing these inequalities is a necessity.
We need to examine who these systems and spaces are designed for, who is not being considered, who has been excluded by the business models we use, and what interests take precedence. As we work together to rebuild these structures we need to commit to move from conversations to concrete commitments and to make each other accountable to achieve real progress.” (Open Access Week)

Sponsored by: AmeliCA, UNESCO, Redalyc, CLACSO

Aimed at: young researchers, undergraduate or graduate students from Latin American universities. Students from Latin America who are studying at universities outside the region can also participate.

Submission Guidelines:

• 1.      All works must be elaborated individually in the essay modality considering the main theme of the contest: “Open with Purpose: Taking Actions to Build Structural Equity and Inclusion”. There are six thematic categories:
  • a.     Students, academics, and Open Access. Reflection on how students and academics conduct their research activities following the Open Access model.
  • b.  Open Access to information at universities. Reflection on the technologies, platforms, projects and/or repositories in Open Access that Latin American universities have, in order to support the academic and research activities of their community.
  • c.     Public and private science: reflections on equity and participation.
    Reflection on the type of science you want to have in Latin America: one that is in the hands of academia or one that follows the commercial model of the big publishers.
  • d.     The impact of Open Access during the COVID-19 health emergency. Reflection on how the Open Access model has influenced the generation, publication and visibility of scientific knowledge generated on SARS-COV-2 and COVID-19.
  • e.     Open Access policies at universities. Reflection on the internal policies that Latin American universities have on Open Access to the knowledge generated and published by their academic and research community.
  • f.     Access to information and inclusion to vulnerable groups. Reflection on the need to take into account vulnerable groups in the design of policies, projects and implementation of solutions that follow the model of Open Access to information.
• 2.      Contestants may participate with a single work, which must be unpublished, original and must not have been published in whole or in part.
• 3.      An essay will be understood as a short work that carries out an analysis and reflection with a predominance of critical thinking, based on self-reflection, supported by logic and with solid theoretical based arguments that back up the positions and opinions about the topic. The language used must be clear and accessible to everyone, redacted in a free-style prose.
• 4.      Language: Portuguese or Spanish.
• 5.      The structure of the essay must contain the following elements:
  • a.     Title.
  • b.     Index (optional).
  • c.     Abstract (maximum 300 words).
  • d.     Introduction.
  • e.     Content Development.
  • f.     Conclusions.
  • g.     References.
  • h.     Annexes (if necessary).
• 6.      The maximum length is 15 letter-size pages (maximum 6,000 words), using 12-point Times New Roman font, 1.5 spacing, justified text and numbered pages. The upper and left margins of 3 cm, and lower and right of 2.5 cm. The document format can be Word © or OpenOffice Writer.
• 7.      To submit the essay you must fill out the following form: https://forms.gle/1GYGCaGKu9tivGhe6 until the deadline. It is necessary to attach the essay file and the certificate or proof of studies file.
• 8.      Three prizes will be awarded per category:

• •    First Place: 500 USD, official diploma, and publication of the essay.
• •    Second Place: 300 USD, official diploma, and publication of the essay.
• •    Third Place: 200 USD, official diploma, and publication of the essay.

Publication of essays: The essays that are chosen by the Evaluation Committee will be published in a book by the conveying institutions, therefore the authors accept the publication of their essays.

Evaluation Committee: Members of CLACSO’s Working Group “Open Knowledge as a Common Good”

Dates and deadlines:

Publication of the rules: September 30, 2020.
Last date for submission: December 28, 2020.
Work review period: from January 4 to 22, 2021.
Announcement of winners: January 29, 2021.
Delivery of diplomas and publication of the essays: May 28th, 2021.

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