Fondren Fellows Project Proposal
Names:
Kathy Weimer, Head of Kelley Center for Government Information, Data and Geospatial
Services, Monica Rivero, Digital Curation Coordinator and Scott Carlson, Metadata Coordinator
Department: Fondren Library
Phone: x8086
Email: kathy.weimer@rice.edu, mpr1@rice.edu, scarlson@rice.edu
Project Title: Enhancing Access to Accompanying Material in Earth Sciences Theses and
Dissertations
When would project work take place: in the summer of 2016, fall of 2016, or either?
Either
1. Please provide a brief (up to 500 word) summary of the proposed project, explaining why it
is suitable for the Fondren Fellows program.
Many Earth Science theses and dissertations include oversized visual resources such as
seismic profiles and geologic cross sections. Unfortunately, due to early scanning techniques,
digital reproductions were captured at low quality, with oddly cropped pages, restricting their
utility for scholarship and further research. Fondren Library is working with the Earth Science
department to identify works with relevant accompanying materials, such as maps and cross
sections in their historical masters and doctoral papers. Once identified, the goal is to digitize
such materials at higher resolutions and apply current scanning and image technology to
improve the display of these materials1. All images will be made available through the Rice
Digital Scholarship Archive as a file attached to the record for the thesis or dissertation with
which it is associated. There are approximately 50 historical manuscripts identified dating from
the 1980s through early 2000s. Each manuscript may have a few to dozens of related oversized
accompanying materials .
Digitizing these materials is a necessary first step, but equally critical is findability by scholars.
Adding key terms specially related to the geologic content and in the natural language used by
scholars, will improve potential researchers’ ability to locate these resources. As a Fondren
Fellow, she or he will be responsible for providing enhanced search terms to aid in discovery of
these visually rich and unique materials, gain experience in the subject of geology and earth
sciences, and working with digital objects and applying best practices in creating metadata.
2. Outline the key tasks that the Fondren Fellow would work on.
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Review abstracts or other introductory text of Earth Science theses and dissertations for
geological formation names and assign terms to individual papers
For an example of a JPEG2000 image format that allows users to “zoom” into image details, please see Harrison, John
Christopher. "Melville Island's salt-based fold belt (Arctic Canada)." (1991) Doctoral, Rice University.
http://hdl.handle.net/1911/16447.
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Create a thesaurus of geological formation names
Develop project guidelines for long term work in this area
Depending on student’s skill level and interest, could include a text mining component
3. What qualifications would you expect from students working on this project?
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Interest in the field of Earth Sciences
Basic skills with spreadsheets or willingness to learn
Navigation and searching of online database/archive or willingness to learn
4. What would students learn through their participation in this project?
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Gain understanding of geology terminology
Gain understanding of digital library design and infrastructure
How to apply best practices in creating metadata and documentation for digital projects.