USRN Discovery Pilot: Increasing the Discoverability of Open Access Content Through a National Network

TL;DR

The USRN Discovery Pilot significantly improved the discoverability of US-based open access research outputs by leveraging CORE services, tools, and strategic interventions, resulting in a 50% increase in discoverable content across repositories.

Contribution

This study demonstrates a successful collaborative approach to enhancing research discoverability using CORE indexing and new tools, with measurable improvements and scalable strategies.

Findings

50% increase in discoverable research outputs

Introduction of new tools like CORE Reindexing Button

Development of guidelines and strategies for scaling

Abstract

This paper presents the results of the USRN Discovery Pilot Project, a collaboration of SPARC, the Confederation of Open Access Repositories (COAR), CORE and Antleaf, to enhance the discoverability of research papers in US repositories leveraging CORE as an indexing service for USRN repositories. The project conducted actions in three strategic areas: Assessing and quantitatively measuring discoverability and barriers to it at the beginning and end of the pilot project, conducting interventions to increase discoverability, and supporting interventions by technology and guidelines (provided by CORE services), to minimise effort and maximise effect. The key results of the project include: Around three-quarters of a million research outputs held in the selected US repositories have been made discoverable (a 50% increase) compared to the year before; The project has made available the CORE Data Provider's Guide as well as a selection of new and improved tools to support repositories in increasing their discoverability. These include the CORE Reindexing Button and Index Notification modules, Fresh Finds and the USRN Desirable Characteristics for Digital Publication Repositories checking tool. The project team is now exploring ways to scale out this work to include more repositories.