It has been said that “without knowledge action is useless, and knowledge without action is futile”. This ethos lies at the heart of the Forum for Open Research in MENA (FORM), and underpins our mission to support the development and implementation of Open Science policies and practises in higher education institutions and research communities across the Arab states.

Open Science in higher education institutions and research communities is a highly complex and rapidly evolving landscape, and there are many ways of transforming knowledge into practical action. We have therefore identified 4 thematic areas for this year’s Annual Forum, reflecting the priorities of our members and wider network across the Arab states:

Policies and funding:
- Open access and research assessment policies
- Funding sources and allocations
- Developing policies and determining best practises to support sustainability in Arab scholarly communications ecosystems
- Incorporating SDGs in research and education strategic planning

Open Access publishing and open education resources
- Preprints, transparent peer review, and open access publishing
- Creating and disseminating open resources
- The commercialisation of Open Science
- Building and using Institutional repositories

Capacity building and community engagement
- Adapting and decolonising practises and resources for the Arab region
- Building and Sustaining Communities of Practices (CoP) in Arabic speaking countries
- Digital and human capacity building

Open infrastructure and infrastructure supporting Open Science
- The rise of community-owned and community-led Open Science infrastructures and publications
- Implementing reproducible, open and interoperable infrastructure in the Arab region
- Using AI to advance engagement with open science policies and practises in the Arab world

We invite proposals for presentations, round table discussions, and workshops (in English or Arabic) linked with any aspect of the themes and topics listed above. Particular preference will be given to regional case studies relating to the challenged and solutions within our thematic areas, offering new and innovative examples of transforming Open Science knowledge into policies and practises in the Arab region.

The submission deadline is the 1st of June. The proposals will be reviewed by the Advisory Board, and acceptance notifications sent out in early July.

Proposals should be submitted via this online form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdZC7PpNHaivGFH9uKnJKTazOPKgS2nwaZozsVgEcN59WeE-Q/viewform