Global Campus User's Day 2026

Earlier this week, on the afternoon of 26 October, Global Campus users came together for the second edition of our User’s Day. What followed was an afternoon of shared discoveries, honest conversation and two plenaries that looked beyond the platform to the bigger questions facing scholarly publishing.

In his plenary, Ludo Waltman took on the challenges facing peer review today, and offered a different way of thinking about the future of scholarly publishing.

Rather than treating peer review as a single gatekeeping step, Ludo explored a reform towards peer engagement: a model in which scholarly communities interact with research more openly and continuously.

Central to that vision is the use of trust markers. It was a thought-provoking session that sparked plenty of discussion in the room.

The most valuable moments of the day came from users themselves in the workshops. As people shared how they work with Global Campus, others discovered features they hadn't yet explored, and new ways of using familiar ones. A workflow that one team takes for granted turned out to be a revelation for another. That kind of peer-to-peer learning is hard to replicate in documentation or a training session. Thanks to the workshop of Rosie of the British Heart Foundation, we left with a clearer picture of how Global Campus is used in practice, and a list of ideas we're keen to follow up on.

One suggestion came up clearly: a library of short use-case videos. Being able to go back and watch how others run their workflows would help users adapt those approaches to their own context. It's a great idea, and one we're taking on board.

In the other workshop, Eoin Gunnigle of University College Cork, showed how a more strategic approach to Horizon Europe funding as a grants office is empowered by Global Campus. The question underpinning the workshop was how the role of humans would look like if there's so much that AI can do. It turns out that role is still very important. Mapping all funding against researchers and suggesting collaboration partners is one thing, but building the confidence with researchers who are new to European funding that they can write a competitive proposal, and building the trust with collaboration partners is something very human to do and very necessary to win grant money!

Philipp Hess brought the conversation to a very practical part of the publishing journey: submission.

He showed how Publishing Gateway is working to improve the submission process, and why that matters to all three groups involved. For researchers, it means less friction getting their work out. For institutions and publishers, it means a smoother, more connected process on their side too.

Users Day reminded us that Global Campus is shaped by the people who use it. The questions you asked and the ideas you shared will feed directly into how we develop the platform.

A warm thank you to Ludo and Philipp for their plenaries, Rosie and Eoin for leading two fantastic workshops and to everyone who joined us and contributed so generously.