The UB’s research quality
The UB CRAI has gathered, in a reference website, the UB scientific journals that are best positioned in the indexes of Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus, and those with a FECYT quality label. This web links to the RCUB main website, which shows the University’s scientific journals. This initiative wants to bring prestige and acknowledgement to the research studies carried out by the UB research groups regarding quantity and quality.
The UB CRAI has gathered, in a reference website, the UB scientific journals that are best positioned in the indexes of Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus, and those with a FECYT quality label. This web links to the RCUB main website, which shows the University’s scientific journals. This initiative wants to bring prestige and acknowledgement to the research studies carried out by the UB research groups regarding quantity and quality.
In 2010, the University of Barcelona started, through the Vice-rector’s Office of Outreach and Internationalization, the calls for the recognition of the UB’s scientific journals and grants to publish them. Since 2022, this is done by the Vice-retor’s Office of Institutional Relations, Communication and Language Policy. These calls are aimed to award an economic aid to the journals edited by UB members (research group, teaching staff, and UB’s specific centers or departments) that publish or want to publish journals in digital edition, but the grant can be also applied to the parallel edition in paper.
The rector’s delegate for open science, Ignasi Labastida, notes that “in 2022, the grant was 67,000 euros, and we expect an increase in the 2023 budget”. The UB grant call is open to the journals that fulfil the requirements stated in the Regulation of scientific journals of the University of Barcelona, approved by the Governing Council on 13 May 2022. In order to get the grant, applicants must have submitted at least one issue since the last call. Labastida says that, “there will be an analysis for the journals that have been submitted to see if they fulfil the requirements of the call, and there will be an evaluation according to the criteria; once this is done, every title gets a mark”. “In order to make a fair distribution of the grants —he continues—, there are a series of values established depending on the obtained mark”.
Moreover, there are support initiatives to improve the indexation of the journals. For instance, there is a generic guideline and specific guidelines (depending on the platform) with recommendations. “We support journals that apply for the first time —says Labastida— and those that want to renew their obtaining of a quality label. We carry out customized evaluations for the journals that have a potential to enter the indexing platforms following the established criteria, and we monitor the application of the criteria. If appropriate, we can start the process of inclusion request”.
Another important aspect is the obtention of quality labels. The formal content of the journal meets the requirements as long as they do not go against the criteria of the Regulation of scientific journals of the University of Barcelona. “Then the application is submitted and we wait for the results”, notes Labastida.
Regarding this issue, the rector's delegate for language policy and publications, Joan Santanach, states that the institution is "very powerful in this area, with groups that are doing a wonderful job in very diverse disciplines, and the seventy related scientific journals at the UB they are a magnificent showcase". And he concludes: "This is an issue, moreover, that must be linked to open access to knowledge and the presence of Catalan in the field of research, aspects that, despite not being exclusive to the UB, help to define its policy in this area».