Dear James, This is coming closer to your concept:- https://www.cos.io/initiatives/registered-reports?_ga=2.256611083.1499354793.1646731928-1289064925.1646731928 which I learned about in the current issue of Research Professional:- https://research.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2022/03/08/octopus-jisc-and-ukrn-working-together-to-create-a-new-primary-research-record-for-science/ Neither of which seem to involve funders however. No reply as yet to my direct message @HelliwellJohn to @asapbio Greetings, John
Emeritus Professor John R Helliwell DSc > On 23 Jun 2022, at 14:18, John R Helliwell <jrhelliw...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Dear James, > This is an interesting question you have posed. > > The trend to open peer review reports in articles that we see more often > today got a major kick off by the ASAPBio Workshop some years back > https://asapbio.org/peer-review . The workshop questions to participants > included “would you sign your report?”. Earlier career researchers were not > in favour due to fear of retribution by later career researchers whose > submitted articles they would have to criticise. > > Your question however concerns “open review of research grant proposals?”. > Different approaches have been tried, most famously perhaps the allocate > funds randomly via a lottery. In trying to locate the weblink to that I found > a more comprehensive overview of all sorts of methods and applied to a wide > variety of types of grant proposals > https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/embr.201949472 > Perhaps most interestingly higher risk ie adventurous proposals such as done > by The Wellcome Trust some years back did not involve peer review at all as > reviewers couldn’t be trusted to take anything other than a highly critical > stance. A project manager decided on which got funded. > > On reading your message I have also twitter messaged ASAPBio for any further > info of possible previous workshops that may have addressed open peer review > of research grant proposals, mentioning your name as the originator of the > question. If not, a workshop could be convened. (:-) > > I once was on an interviewing panel for a UK funder Advanced Fellowship. One > applicant opened their interview with the statement “I am very sorry to say > that when I joined a laboratory in country x, the laboratory Head asked to > see my Advanced Fellowship proposal. He put all the staff in the lab to do > the investigations. So, unfortunately their are no new ideas remaining.” > Similarly the developing world’s researchers are very worried about the > Global North sucking up their data, of all kinds, and doing the analyses that > they would like to do themselves but more slowly. Open science will need very > careful implementation. UNESCO are currently giving this a very serious go: > https://www.unesco.org/en/natural-sciences/open-science . > > Greetings, > John > > Emeritus Professor John R Helliwell DSc > IUCr Representative to CODATA, > IUCr Representative to UNESCO’s Open Science discussions. > > > > >> On 23 Jun 2022, at 02:08, James Holton <jmhol...@lbl.gov> wrote: >> >> Greetings all, >> >> I'd like to ask a question that I expect might generate some spirited >> discussion. >> >> We have seen recently a groundswell of support for openness and transparency >> in peer review. Not only are pre-prints popular, but we are also seeing >> reviewer comments getting published along with the papers themselves. >> Sometimes even signed by the reviewers, who would have traditionally >> remained anonymous. >> >> My question is: why don't we also do this for grant proposals? >> >> I know this is not the norm. However, after thinking about it, why wouldn't >> we want the process of how funding is awarded in science to be at least as >> transparent as the process of publishing the results? Not that the current >> process isn't transparent, but it could be more so. What if applications, >> and their reviewer comments, were made public? Perhaps after an embargo >> period? There could be great benefits here. New investigators especially, >> would have a much clearer picture of format, audience, context and >> convention. I expect unsuccessful applications might be even more valuable >> than successful ones. And yet, in reality, those old proposals and >> especially the comments almost never see the light of day. Monumental >> amounts of work goes into them, on both sides, but then get tucked away into >> the darkest corners of our hard drives. >> >> So, 2nd question is: would you do it? Would you upload your application into >> the public domain for all to see? What about the reviewer comments? If not, >> why not? Afraid people will steal your ideas? Well, once something is >> public, its pretty clear who got the idea first. >> >> 3rd question: what if the service were semi-private? and you got to get >> comments on your proposal before submitting it to your funding agency? Would >> that be helpful? What if in exchange for that service you had to review 2-3 >> other applications? Would that be worth it? >> >> Or, perhaps, I'm being far too naiive about all this. For all I know there >> are some rules against doing this I'm not aware of. Either way, I'm >> interested in what this community thinks. Please share your views! On- or >> off-list is fine. >> >> -James Holton >> MAD Scientist >> >> ######################################################################## >> >> To unsubscribe from the CCP4BB list, click the following link: >> https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/WA-JISC.exe?SUBED1=CCP4BB&A=1 >> >> This message was issued to members of www.jiscmail.ac.uk/CCP4BB, a mailing >> list hosted by www.jiscmail.ac.uk, terms & conditions are available at >> https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/policyandsecurity/ ######################################################################## To unsubscribe from the CCP4BB list, click the following link: https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/WA-JISC.exe?SUBED1=CCP4BB&A=1 This message was issued to members of www.jiscmail.ac.uk/CCP4BB, a mailing list hosted by www.jiscmail.ac.uk, terms & conditions are available at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/policyandsecurity/
