Promoting open access at the federal level - The Tech

" ... Over the past three years, we have pushed Congress to pass bills that establish an open access policy, most recently encapsulated in the Fair Access to Science and Technology Research (FASTR) bill which has been introduced to both houses of Congress by bipartisan groups during the current legislative session (S. 350 and H.R. 708). The proposed legislation is modeled after an existing National Institutes of Health (NIH) policy and would require government agencies with research expenditures exceeding $100 million per year (such as the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Defense, among others) to set up digital archives for publications resulting from their grants. Researchers would be required to post their manuscripts to the digital archive within six months of publication. There are reasonable exceptions to protect classified research and patentable discoveries ... In response to a We the People petition that reflects growing public support, the Obama Administration has recently issued an executive order to implement open access to research funded by the largest (in terms of research expenditure) federal agencies. While the President’s support is encouraging, an executive order generally lacks the longevity of federal law. It is therefore critical to continue our efforts to incorporate open access policies into the law.  Many groups have pushed for adopting this type of policy universally across all federal research grant agencies. MIT’s Graduate Student Council (GSC) as well as a larger umbrella organization of graduate students, the National Association of Graduate-Professional Students (NAGPS), have persistently lobbied Congress to adopt such policies. To our knowledge, we are the only student groups advocating for open access in Washington.  If you support improving the nation’s access to federally-funded research, then we strongly encourage you not only to contact your local and home representatives in Congress, but to join us in discussing how these policies affect you and your communities and how you can contribute to making open access the law of the land."