Integrating FAIR and open research data management practices in academic rewarding systems (NFDI4Earth Deliverable D4.2.5)

This work examines how open science practices and the FAIR Guiding Principles for scientific data management and stewardship can be more effectively integrated into the systems that recognise and reward academic work. It outlines the current academic reward system, recent proposals for responsible research assessment such as DORA, the Leiden Manifesto, and CoARA, and the specific challenges around recognising research data quality and research data metrics. The paper highlights how NFDI4Earth members -- as researchers, members of academic societies, journal editors, and grant reviewers -- can support the cultural shift required to reward FAIR and open research data practices alongside traditional publication metrics.