Research Data Management
(RDM) initiatives
Sarah Jones
Digital Curation Centre
sarah.jones@glasgow.ac.uk
Twitter: sjDCC
WHY IS RDM IMPORTANT TO UNIS?
“Data sets are
becoming the
new instruments
of science”
Dan Atkins, University of Michigan
Digital data as
the new special
collections?
Sayeed Choudhury, Johns Hopkins
Research data:
institutional
crown jewels?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lifes__too_short__to__drink__cheap__wine/4754234186/
Expectations of public access
“Publicly funded research data are a public good,
produced in the public interest, which should be
made openly available with as few restrictions as
possible in a timely and responsible manner that
does not harm intellectual property.”
RCUK Common Principles on Data Policy
http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/research/Pages/DataPolicy.aspx
…open data
http://www.bis.gov.uk/innovatingforgrowth
7
...personal data
“EPSRC expects all those it funds to have
developed a clear roadmap to align their policies
and processes with EPSRC’s expectations by 1st
May 2012, and to be fully compliant with these
expectations by 1st May 2015.”
...institutional responsibility
www.epsrc.ac.uk/about/standards/researchdata/Pages/default.aspx
HOW IS RDM BEING SUPPORTED?
- DCC Institutional Engagements
- Jisc Managing Research Data programmes
The DCC Mission
“Helping to build capacity,
capability and skills in data
management and curation
across the UK’s higher
education research
community”
Phase 3 Business Plan
www.dcc.ac.uk
DCC Institutional Engagements
With funding from HEFCE we’re:
• Working intensively with 21 HEIs to increase RDM capability
– 60 days of effort per HEI drawn from a mix of DCC staff
– Deploy DCC & external tools, new approaches & best practice
• Support varies based on what each institution wants/needs
• Lessons & examples will be shared with the community
www.dcc.ac.uk/community/institutional-engagements
Some unis we are working with
Common DCC IE activities
• Establishing steering groups
• Making the case for RDM
• Assessing needs
• Developing policy and strategy
• Piloting tools
• Offering DMP consultations
• Delivering training
• Setting up guidance websites
• ...
Jisc MRD programmes
• MRD 01: October 2009 – July 2011
– £4.3 million investment
– www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/mrd.aspx
• MRD 02 – October 2011 – July 2013
– £4.6 million investment
– www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/di_research
management/managingresearchdata.aspx
Programme Manager: Simon Hodson s.hodson@jisc.ac.uk
Jisc MRD strands
• RDM Infrastructure projects
• DMP projects – guidance, training and tools
• RDM training – disciplinary and support staff
• Citation and publishing
DEVELOPING RDM SERVICES
- Examples of RDM initiatives at UK unis
Components of RDM services
Institutional RDM policies
www.dcc.ac.uk/resources/policy-and-legal/institutional-data-policies
Early research data policies
legal tone / language
a section in uni DM policy
useful guide as appendix
“Statement of commitment”
 Infrastructure  policy
“10 commandments”
mutual promises
aspirational
Baseline of RCUK Code
+ procedures & support
Based on Edin.
with a few
additions
RDM strategies and roadmaps
A series of blog posts
www.dcc.ac.uk/news
Links to example roadmaps
http://tiny.cc/EPSRCroadmaps
University of Bath RDM roadmap
• Based on Monash University RDM strategy
• Identifies the current position and proposes activity
• Defines roles and responsibilities and timeframes
http://www.bath.ac.uk/rdso/University-of-Bath-Roadmap-for-EPSRC.pdf
Guidance webpages
www.gla.ac.uk/datamanagement
www.bath.ac.uk/research/data
Training
http://datalib.edina.ac.uk/mantra
Training for librarians
• Data Intelligence for librarians, 3TU, Netherlands
http://dataintelligence.3tu.nl/en/about-the-course
• DIY Training Kit for Librarians, University of Edinburgh
http://datalib.edina.ac.uk/mantra/libtraining.html
• RDM for librarians, DCC
http://www.dcc.ac.uk/training/rdm-librarians
• RDMRose, University of Sheffield
http://rdmrose.group.shef.ac.uk
• SupportDM modules, University of East London
http://www.uel.ac.uk/trad/outputs/resources
Data Management Planning support
• Guidelines / templates on what to include in plans
• Example answers, guidance and links to local support
• A library of successful DMPs to reuse
• Tailored consultancy services
• Online tools (e.g. customised DMPonline)
• Links / flags embedded in grant systems
• ...
Research data storage
• £2m funding to date
• Petascale facility – expandable
• 3 machine rooms – resilience
(tape archive 2012)
• Available to all researchers for
research data
1st 5TB free per Data Steward then
£400 per TB p.a. for disk storage;
tape backup £40 per TB
http://data.bris.ac.uk
Blue Peta at Bristol
Institutional data repositories
http://datashare.is.ed.ac.uk
Not intended to
replace national,
subject or other
established data
repositories
Research Data at Essex and
DataPool at Southampton
Acknowledge hybrid
environment
www.dspace.cam.ac.uk
https://databank.ora.ox.ac.uk
Bringing it all together into a service
Diagram courtesy of Sally Rumsey, University of Oxford
What do you still need to do?
Guide and case studies:
www.dcc.ac.uk/resources/
developing-rdm-services
Thanks – any questions?
DCC guidance, tools and case studies:
www.dcc.ac.uk/resources
Follow us on twitter:
@digitalcuration and #ukdcc