Strategic Direction Recommendations for UW Digital Repository

From the CUWL Task Force

 

 

The CUWL Task Force on Strategic Directions for a UW Digital Repository recommends that CUWL continue the MINDS@UW repository as a valuable service and establish an advisory committee for oversight and governance.  It is currently based on the D-Space software, but other solutions will be explored as new developments occur. The following recommendations address the specific issues outlined in the charge to the Task Force, as well as issues identified by the Task Force during its discussions.

 

1. Define the purpose, scope, and goals of a UW digital repository or repositories
2. Identify the needs of faculty and staff in regard to digital repositories
3. Identify the needed services and functions
4. Explore appropriate governance structures
5. Recommend a model
6. Identify and investigate the relationship of any new repository or repositories with other repository programs within UWS
7. Identify and investigate the relationship of any new repository or repositories with other repository programs world-wide
8. Develop a marketing and public relations plan
9. Define relationship to other services such as Learn@UW, UWDC, portals, and Google
10. Develop a business model for institutional support 
11. Task Force recommendations for an Advisory Committee

 

The Task Force also recommends a higher level steering committee to coordinate related UW system and individual campus initiatives. 

 

n      Define the purpose, scope, and goals of a UW digital repository or repositories;

 

MINDS@UW provides a repository service for distributed depositing of materials with local community responsibility and control of the repository content.   The Committee should also consider taking a more active role in the procurement of content like the University of Oregon and others, “harvesting content” from departmental websites, etc.  

 

The repository facilitates access and insures preservation of the bit-streams of content created, selected and deposited by the University of Wisconsin system-wide community. 

 

The content can range from “formal” or “official” publications to research notes and instructional materials.  Submitters are responsible for insuring copyright compliance of all deposited content.

 

The services associated with a digital repository such as copyright help, harvesting of content, metadata support, and exploration of alternatives to traditional scholarly communication models are also important in considering the scope of a digital repository effort.

 

n      Identify the needs of faculty and staff in regard to digital repositories;

 

Information created by UW communities is increasingly in digital format.  Almost no campuses or units have policies or infrastructure to make these materials accessible or preserved into the future. 

 

Faculty/staff need shared access to existing digital resources which can be used for instruction and research.

 

The MINDS@UW provides an infrastructure for the collection and preservation of the historical record of the University’s academic programs and intellectual content which exist in electronic format.

 

Our traditional archives are not positioned to handle the volume of born-digital materials which document the instructional and research activities of our campuses.  Opportunities for collaboration with campus archivists should be explored.

 

The repository is also a component of transforming scholarly communication both as an alternative to traditional publishing mechanisms and as a way to facilitate discussions of open access publishing. 

 

The Task Force has identified a number of basic needs required by faculty, staff, librarians, and administrators that have implications for any digital repository efforts.  These include but are not limited to:

1. Improve visibility of the UW system’s excellence in research and education
2. Provide access and awareness to digital content (including learning objects)
3. Archive and preserve digital materials
4. Provide a publication space (both formal and informal)
5. Create a collaborative workspace
6. Improve the discovery of digital objects for research and education

 

How does the current MINDS@UW fill or not fill the needs of faculty and staff outlined above:

 

1.      Highlights the productivity of individual communities at the same time bringing together the research and educational output of the UW System together in one digital location.

2.      Makes it easy for faculty and staff to make their digital content accessible online and increases awareness of the content through Google and OAI harvesting.

3.      Allows for centralized housing of digital content to facilitate digital preservation and allow access to digital content in the future.

4.      Provides for easy online publication and dissemination of information—however has limited abilities to provide for a traditional peer-review process.

5.      Does not allow for a collaborative workspace.

6.      Collocates digital objects in one searchable and accessible online location.

 

How it is different from UWDC

The repository seeks to both provide access and preserve digital content.  It differs from the digital library collections in two major ways:

 

1. The collections are controlled by the content creators—such as academic departments, research centers and libraries, rather than librarians as in the digital library models.
2. The service does not include digitization of  materials, if this is needed it is the responsibility of the content provider to do so.

 

 

n      Identify the needed services and functions

 

The current software offers numerous functions and services.  The Advisory Committee should continue to assess additional or different needs, which could be addressed through local development, integration with other software packages, or evaluating alternative repository software solutions in the future.   For example, utilizing the repository for digital publishing preservation needs, using RSS feeds to notify users of new content, and the integration of the repository with SFX, Metalib, and RefWorks initiatives.

 

 

n      Explore appropriate governance structures

 

Establish an Advisory Committee for governance of the repository initiative.  The Task Force recommends that the Advisory Committee include:

ú         Faculty or academic teaching staff

ú         CUWL representative

ú         OLIT liaison

ú         Public service librarian

ú         Learning technology representative

ú         Archivist

ú         MINDS@UW coordinator

ú         MINDS@UW supervisor

 

 Faculty and staff are particularly critical for shaping the repository project.  The Committee membership should be re-assessed, particularly as new types of content are deposited.  The responsibility of this committee would be to oversee the MINDS@UW service as well as explore and participate in larger strategic issues.

 

The Task Force also recommends that a UW System Steering Committee on Digital Repositories be formed to address larger related strategic issues that are outside the scope of library-sponsored initiatives (such as an exploration of courseware repositories and other collaborative workspace issues).  This committee should explore and identify options to ingrate oversight, coordination, and governance of related services and systems.  This would hopefully include learning technology representatives, IT support representatives, librarians, administrators, and other stakeholders. 

 

 

n      Recommend a model

 

Recommend that each campus identify a person to serve as liaison with the UWDCCenter’s Repository Librarian, similar to the Learn@UW initiative.    Work with librarians on each campus to develop outreach programs to their faculty and staff.  The Task Force also recommends exploring other models such as “harvesting” content.

 

The developed model should also show how the library effort, MINDS@UW, integrates into bigger plans for technology support, instruction and research and how it fits with other repositories and services.

 

 

n      Identify and investigate the relationship of any new repository or repositories with other repository programs within UWS

 

While no other established repositories for digital content have been identified within UWS, numerous pilot projects or informal efforts exist.  Most all seem focused on collaborative work environments, access and/or shared use, rather these combined with preservation.    The MINDS@UW should continue to monitor these activities such as the Wisconsin Federated Resources (an effort focused on creating a shared work environment for learning object developers) and the ADL-Co Lab(they are exploring various software options for creating learning object repositories), Desire 2 Learn repository, and explore opportunities for the integration and not duplication of these services.

 

 

n      Identify and investigate the relationship of any new repository or repositories with other repository programs world-wide

 

Another important role is to monitor international developments for repositories and identify possible collaboration or integration opportunities.  The ADL Co-Lab is particularly valuable to inform the Advisory Committee.   Explore and evaluate other repository and digital preservation software and systems as they become available.

 

n      Develop a marketing and public relations plan

 

The Advisory Committee should develop and implement a marketing plan to insure that librarians, faculty, and staff are aware of the service and how it can benefit them.   The Committee should also try to optimize the marketing potential by integrating the repository into discussions about digital preservation, records management, scholarly communication, and digital publishing efforts. 

 

This could include presentations in new faculty workshops offered by campuses, as well as shared promotional material that could be used by each campus.  The initiative must develop a strategy to make the communities aware of the service and its value to them.   Continue campus visits, presentations, workshops, articles and conferences.

 

n      Define relationship to other services such as Learn@UW, UWDC, portals, and Google

 

Information Technology changes continually create new options for use, access and integration of digital content for faculty, staff and students.  Particular services of note are the UWDC, Campus portals, Learn@UW, and external initiatives such as Google’s digitization of content.  Explore opportunities for integration with digital publishing initiatives.  Discovering, accessing, and using digital content from multiple sources are all important for users’ learning and research, and possibilities to integrate with other library discovery tools such as Metalib and SFX should be explored.

 

n      Develop a business model for institutional support

 

Funding is needed to allow possible users to learn the potential and value to them.  Without that in today’s fiscal climate of reduced support, both individuals and departments are unlikely to put funds into a new service which hasn’t yet proven itself.  Faculty and staff understanding and assessment of repository services are gradually evolving in a constantly changing digital environment.   Institutional funding and staff will be needed for ongoing operations once a project is firmly underway.  Recommend exploring grant funding—not for long term support but to explore the ways in which we can identify the needs of faculty and staff and explore other models for recruiting content.

 

n      Task Force Recommendations for an Advisory Committee:

 

Advisory Committee should

·        Create policy and procedures document and continually review issues which may require policy development issues include but are not limited to:

ú         Recommend limits on disk space.  Will use require fees for space? 

ú         Consider quality controls. Will communities adequately review and control what is submitted?

ú         Develop requirements for communities/collections. Recommend initial focus and how to get buy-in and avoid burdensome requirements

ú         Consider restrictions on deposited material.  Decide whether any content is unacceptable.  Can a UW person submit content from someone not affiliated, in order for them to provide internet access?  Or must the content be at least partially created by a UW person.

ú         Identify any access control requirements.  Recommend that the service initially be limited to content openly available to the Internet or limited only to all UW System communities.

ú         Consider what student-produced content may be appropriate for a repository or repositories.  Initially recommend, student-produced content be approved and deposited by faculty/staff to insure the overall content quality. 

·        Articulate a preservation plan and an exit strategy.  Might include issues such as migration strategies, what types of file formats are supported, what we will do with content if funding is no longer available etc. 

·        Assess relationship with traditional archives.  Specifically assess how/ifUniversity archivists can/should utilize MINDS@UW for preservation and access of born-digital materials – the types of materials that previously transferred to them in print formats. 

·        Recommend possible solutions and refer to appropriate groups those issues not resolved by the MINDS@UW.  Initially, the MINDS@UW is not viewed as a solution for the archiving and preservation of the Universities administrative records, given the funding sources and needs of Universities’ Records Management.  The Advisory Committee should continually assess whether this should change.

·        Include community and collection policies, content guidelines, administrative procedures, rights and responsibilities of participants, start-up procedures, copyright and licensing agreements, and a statement of UW liability for loss or miss-use of data.

·        Create MINDS@UW web site, with documentation, descriptions, and the policies and procedures.

·        Continually monitor changing environments and needs which might benefit the repository project.

·        Conduct a small survey of faculty and staff needs in regard to the repository and digital preservation, so that we can match this service to their needs.

·        Undertake a functional analysis of the available software options.

 

 

Q://Repository Task Force Recommendation.final.doc

Submitted August 17, 2005