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Bodleian Libraries news for MPLS - April 2021

From the Bodleian’s Public Engagement Department

Roots to Seeds: The Weston Library’s next exhibition based on MPLS research

Portrait of Jacob Bobart the ElderThe installation of Roots to Seeds continues. Next week, portraits of several of the most important names in the history Oxford’s Plant Sciences will be brought to the Weston to be hung in the exhibition. Some examples are Jacob Bobart the Elder, the first keeper of the Botanic Garden, pictured here; Robert Morison, the first professor of botany in the UK, who made the case that ferns reproduced by spores, rather than spontaneous generation; and William Sherard, the great patron of naturalists who endowed the Sherardian Professorship of Botany. 

‘Into the Green’ poetry project

To generate interest in the botanical sciences, the Bodleian’s Education team are working on outreach to secondary schools. One example is ‘Into the Green’, a poetry project working with Oxford Botanic Gardens & Arboretum which will run in the school summer term. Picking up on the themes of the exhibition, and celebrating the 400th anniversary of the Botanic Gardens, ‘Into the Green’ invites secondary school pupils to write a poem inspired by plants, gardens and green spaces.  Award-winning professor of Poetry Alice Oswald will make a selection of poems for inclusion in an anthology.  

Online resources

New subscriptions

Browzine

BrowZine provides access to journals licensed by the Bodleian Libraries from compatible publishers from 2005 onwards. Articles can be accessed directly from SOLO or from the BrowZine website. There are also Browzine apps for Android and iOS, and a Chrome extension which provides links to full-text content of articles while searching the web.

Elsevier ebooks

The Bodleian Libraries now has online access to over 20,000 ebooks published by Elsevier until 24 February 2022, predominantly on science and medicine. Titles are available via SOLO.

3D scanning at home

The RSL’s Richard Smith has expanded our 3D printing guide to include information on how you can produce 3D scans at home without expensive hardware.

Open Access and Open Scholarship news

RCUK/UKRI Open Access Block Grant

Oxford’s RCUK/UKRI Open Access Block Grant has been confirmed for the new grant year, 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022. Our current allocation policy is set to continue, whereby we pay open access publication costs for fully OA journals (i.e. those indexed in the DOAJ), or for hybrid journals which are covered by a Read and Publish agreement (details of these agreements can be seen on our Read and Publish deals page).

Read and Publish agreements

The University has signed up to two major Read and Publish agreements, negotiated via Jisc, this last month:

  • Oxford University Press

This agreement allows University of Oxford corresponding authors to publish research articles and review articles Gold OA in over 400 hybrid and fully OA journals. Authors must use their Oxford University email address when submitting articles to the journal, and choose the CC BY publication licence. (Please note that some society titles do not offer a CC BY option). OUP will ask the author to select ‘UK Institutions (JISC affiliated)’ when completing the online licencing/payment process. Further information can be seen on the OUP webpages.

  • Taylor & Francis

This agreement allows University of Oxford corresponding authors to publish research articles in over 2,000 hybrid ‘Open Select’ journals. Authors must use their Oxford University email address when submitting articles to the journal, and choose the CC BY publication licence. For more details see Publishing open access with Open Select - Author Services.

Library space and physical services

Up-to-date information on services from the Bodleian Libraries.

Radcliffe Science Library/Vere Harmsworth Library opening hours

Easter vacation (from Tuesday 6 April to Friday 23 April):

  • Monday-Friday: 9.30am – 7pm
  • Saturday: 10am – 2pm
  • Sunday: Closed

Trinity term (from Saturday 24 April):

  • Monday-Friday: 9.30am – 9pm
  • Saturday: 10am – 4pm
  • Sunday: 11am – 5pm

Booking is still required until further notice.

OXR Hub: Completion of Feasibility Study Using VR to Reduce Inequalities in Education

The Oxford X-Reality Hub (who include the RSL’s Richard Smith) and Oxfordshire County Council have completed a feasibility study aimed towards reducing inequalities in educational attainment. The EdTech in the Cloud project aims to bridge the socioeconomic education gap by exploring how scalable immersive technologies could improve the learning experience in secondary schools.