Data Curation Network: How Do We Compare? A Snapshot of Six Academic Library Institutions’ Data Repository and Curation Services

Abstract

Objective: Many academic and research institutions are exploring opportunities to better support researchers in sharing their data. As partners in the Data Curation Network project, our six institutions developed a comparison of the current levels of support provided for researchers to meet their data sharing goals through library-based data repository and curation services. Methods: Each institutional lead provided a written summary of their services based on a previously developed structure, followed by group discussion and refinement of descriptions. Service areas assessed include the repository services for data, technologies used, policies, and staffing in place. Conclusions: Through this process we aim to better define the current levels of support offered by our institutions as a first step toward meeting our project's overarching goal to develop a shared staffing model for data curation across multiple institutions.

Keywords

• digital repositories
• research data management (RDM) services
• institutional repositories
• academic libraries
• scholarly communications
• data curation