2026-10-28 –, Naturalis 01
As gold models of Open Access rise in popularity, Institutional Repositories (IRs) have emerged as strong, reliable paths towards openness. Despite this, there has been a lack of uniformity in how institutions of higher education promote and embed PIDs in their IRs. This talk will address how one institution, the American University in Cairo (AUC), has begun to explore the utilization of PIDs in its’ IR. AUC’s IR, the Knowledge Fountain, will be compared with IRs around the globe to investigate how the case for PIDs can be built in a manner that is locally informed, while also maintaining abreast of changing international standards. This session will act as a case study and provide a potential framework to better understand how players across diverse fields of academia may play a role in expanding access and transparency in research with the use of PIDs.
How do institutional repositories (IRs) use PIDs? In this session you will hear about how one institution, the American University in Cairo (AUC), has begun to explore the utilization of PIDs in its institutional repository. In this lightning talk you will:
Learn about the current landscape of PID use within IRs;
Understand the differences between types of deposits as they relate to PIDs, such as between student theses and dissertations and faculty publications;
Examine the current state of PID use within the AUC community;
Review how the library team at AUC is building a case for PID use within its repository.
You will also hear more about the difference of dynamics between research institutions in the Global North and Global South. What are the unique challenges and opportunities when doing this work in different sociopolitical contexts? How do FAIR principles relating to PIDs change across borders?
Come join me to start thinking about this topic - and expect to leave with many more questions than you came in with!
Alice Kallman is a born and raised New Yorker. After attending the University of Chicago and working for a handful of years in New Orleans at a public defender's office, Alice began her Masters in Library Science at Queens College. She served as a fellow with Citi Center for Culture + Queens Public Library as well as a Scholarly Communications Fellow with CUNY. Post-graduation, she moved into correctional librarianship with the Queens Public Library and assisted graduate students at the CUNY Graduate Center. Alice has presented talks on the topics of justice in librarianship and algorithmic bias, and was awarded a 2025 CUNY Adjunct Incubator Grant to continue a personal research project archiving Syrian superstitions. She now works as a librarian at the American University in Cairo supporting graduate and faculty research. Her current interests include intersections between the Open Access movement, Artificial Intelligence, and Critical Information Literacy.