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PARC FAIR Facilitators

First PARC experts certified as Facilitators for the Go FAIR Foundation 3-Point FAIRification Framework

An intensive year-long hands-on training programme on the 3-Point FAIRification Framework, tailored to the needs and research areas of relevant to PARC (i.e. chemical risk assessment, human biomonitoring, environmental monitoring and toxicology), was led by Barbara Magagna and Erik Schultes of the GO FAIR Foundation. The training programme was designed as a train-the-trainers approach, such that successful completion of all modules qualifies the participants to act as facilitators (hosts) of subsequent events with PARC projects or work packages to support the implementation of FAIR practices. 

The modules in the training programme included:

  • FAIR Awareness, which introduced basic concepts related to FAIR and the tools available;
  • development of FAIR Implementation Profiles (FIP) which are lists of resources utilized by specific communities to make their research outputs (data and accompanying metadata, models, tools) findable, accessible, interoperable and re-usable (FAIR);
  • introductory metadata-for-machines (M4M) workshops which focus on co-development of the needed tools for automation of FAIR workflows, including the development and agreement of structured vocabularies and schematics to show how the data should be organised and linked (data schema). 

Each module of the Facilitator programme requires more than 40 hours of trainee time and includes lectures, hands-on skill development, and participation in, and assisting qualified instructors in delivering, actual workshops. Participants in the facilitators programme also gain the skills to guide the creation of the long-term FAIR governance structures necessary for all organizations.

We are thrilled to announce that the first 11 PARC FAIR experts have achieved their qualification as 3-PFF Facilitators, with a further 7 PARC researchers following a second round of the programme. The 11 recently qualified PARC Facilitators received their certification on 29th January 2024 at the GoFAIR Foundation headquarters in Leiden. Further details on their individual areas of expertise and interest can be found on the GoFAIR Facilitators page. Despite the rather technical nature of some of the work on data FAIRification, an excellent gender balance has been achieved among the qualified facilitators, with 5 of the 11 already qualified being female. This is consistent with the EC’s gender equality in research strategy 2020-2025. Additionally, the experts cover a good geographic spread, with 5 of the 11 facilitators being from institutes in newer member states (Czech Republic, Slovenia), contributing also to the EC mission of widening participation and spreading excellence.

The first 11 qualified facilitators are now empowered to support colleagues across PARC in the FAIRIfication of the PARC research outputs (data, models, tools). A second round of facilitators is currently working through the modules, and a subset of the facilitators are undertaking additional training in further technical aspects of FAIR, including FAIR data points and FAIR orchestration, to streamline the behind-the-scenes processes supporting the PARC FAIR data Hub.   
 

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