Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA)

Background: The idea to write the Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) goes back to the 2012 annual meeting of the American Society of Cell Biology in San Francisco. Since the declaration was published in 2013, DORA has become a global initiative covering all scholarly disciplines. Nearly 24,000 individuals and organizations in 164 countries have signed the declaration.

Mission: DORA supports the development and promotion of best practices in the assessment of scholarly research. It calls for the elimination of journal-based metrics, evaluating research on its own merits, leveraging the use of online publications, and aligning assessment with core academic values.

Community over Commercialization:

“DORA works in service to build a science community that is healthier and more diverse in what it recognizes as worthwhile. We want to expand the range of what scholarship is and what counts. So much of the way people are currently assessed is through journal publications and money. What about affecting your community? What about affecting policy?”

“We’re a nonprofit organization so commercialization is not part of our mandate but community is huge for DORA. This is something we spend a lot of time thinking about—how to create community–to be sure it is expansive and global.”

“Community is incredibly important to our organization and the things that we are attempting to do – because our whole goal is to create positive change within research communities.”

“We have a new project around open access that will significantly expand a portion of our website with resources. Within research assessment, we are trying to support our community members at different points in the process. We are creating tools such as one-pager summaries that can be easily shared to make changes, big and small, for people who are interested in being part of the community of change in research assessment.”

“It’s one thing to do a research project that is really great and technically good, but if it isn’t of interest to your community, you are going to have a tough time. Community really matters to having a research career.”

-Zen Faulkes, program director, The Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA)