This is an important area of activity for projects in the JISCMRD Programme.  All 17 large infrastructure projects are developing policies – in 13 cases these are for the principle host institution.  In the other four – looking at disciplinary or metadata issues across institutions – such policies will apply perhaps at the institutional level, perhaps at the departmental level, across a number of partner institutions.

Agreeing an institutional RDM policy has been viewed as an important step in establishing an effective and sustainable RDM infrastructure and support service.  It sets the tone, underlining an institutional commitment and expectations.  Projects report that the developing a policy has been useful in getting support from key stakeholders, in clarifying priorities and in testing a projects’ understanding of where roles and responsibilities lie in the provision of research data management support.

The DCC has identified three currently public RDM policies in UK universities, as well as a Statement of Commitment.  A number more are currently at advanced stages in the approval process.

Such efforts have been given a shot in the arm by the EPSRC Policy Framework on Research Data, which requires that research institutions prepare an internal roadmap by 1 May 2012.  The roadmap is an instrument – resulting from a gap analysis by which an institution will ensure compliance with EPSRC’s expectations by 1 May 2015.

An institutional RDM policy is likely to be an important part of such efforts.

In parallel breakout sessions, the workshop tackled three thematic areas relating to the development of RDM policies.  These were:

1. What approach are institutions taking to the development of RDM policies?
2. How is support and approval being gained for the ratification of RDM policies?
3. How are institutions planning to support the implementation of the policies?

In a fourth – plenary – session, the workshop discussed issues around the related issue of preparing a roadmap to meet EPSRC requirements.

DCC officers and JISCMRD Evidence Gatherers were on hand to facilitate discussion and to take notes.  The notes will form the basis of outputs from the workshop.  At the time of writing, these are likely to take the form of an abbreviated summary of discussions, key points and outstanding questions.  This will undoubtedly also contribute towards a DCC checklist or step-by-step guide to developing an institutional RDM policy, based upon the experiences and findings of the projects and institution involved.

My immediate ‘take homes’ were as follows:

• A checklist of policies and supporting guidance and help materials for institutions developing and implementing such policies would be very useful.  This is something on which the DCC could work, in collaboration with and collating findings from the JISC Managing Research Data Programme.  Relatedly, Catherine Pink of the Bath Research 360 project has posted a preliminary checklist of guidance required.
• Some projects will be developing guidance materials in the form of researcher targeted scenarios or workthroughs.  This idea was warmly received and it was also suggested that the process of creating such materials could provide valuable deeper understanding of requirements for institutional infrastructure and support services.
• One of a number of recurrent themes over the two days was the question: ‘what research data should be retained’.  It was felt that policies – or the guidance materials supporting them – should do something to guide researchers and support staff in this regard.  Disciplinary research considerations are likely to be the primary determinants of potential reuse value of research data – but it is possible to adduce some general principles.  It was felt that more guidance and – above all – examples in this area would be extremely useful.

Since the workshop, a number of attendees have posted blogs containing reflections and summaries:

Bill Worthington, Research Data Toolkit Hertfordshire Project: Reflections on JISCMRD-DCC Policy Workshop

Laura Molloy, University of Glasgow and JISCMRD Evidence Gatherer: Emerging Themes from the JISCMRD Institutional RDM Policy Workshop

Scott Brander, Cerif for Datasets Project: Institutional Data Management Policies and Roadmaps

Angus Whyte, DCC: Turning Roadmaps into Action

Stephen Gray, data.bris Project: The Value of Research Data

It is worth noting that the scene was set by a couple of blog posts:

Jonathan Tedds, University of Leicester and JISCMRD Evidence Gatherer: Developing Research Data Management Policy

Sarah Jones, DCC: Navigating the Potholes

The event page on the JISC website provides links to presentations given by projects tasked to explore the challenges of designing and implementing data management plans for research projects or for departments in specific disciplines, and to customise and implement the DCC’s DMPonline tool for specific uses.  Information about the projects can be found here and here.

David Shotton, PI of the Oxford DMPonline Project has made the content of the analysis he presented available as a couple of blog posts in which he categorises and aligns the questions that comprise a data management plan ; and then makes comparisons of DMP questions sets and draws conclusions.

At the workshop, Adrian Richardson of DCC demonstrated version 3 of the DMPonline tool and his colleague Kelly Miller ran an exercise to gather feedback and suggestions for further development. Kelly has blogged a summary of these suggestions on the DCC website.

Those with an interest in the interim outputs from the JISC-funded data management planning projects – there are more to come – may be interested in the Appendices to the Workshop Programme where outputs are listed and which may be accessed here.

A competition was held to gather participants’ opinion as to:

1) which project had produced the most reusable outputs;

2) which project had produced the most potentially significant outputs (even if they were not yet reusable); and

3) which project participants wanted to find out more after the workshop.

The winners in each category were awarded a copy of Managing Research Data, ed. Graham Pryor and were as follows:

1) Richard Plant, University of Sheffield, for the Data Management Storage and Planning for Psychology project: website ; blog.

2) Julie McLeod, University of Northumbria, for the Datum in Action: website ; blog.

3) David Shotton, for the Oxford DMPonline Project.

All the projects in this Strand of the Managing Research Data Programme are to be congratulated in their work so far.  Most of these projects will be completing between now and the end of May 2012 and will be making their final deliverables available during that timeframe.

The mistake to make with OAIS is looking at the model and thinking that you have to create a system that is designed in such a way, rather than functions in such a way. The OAIS standard is a tool that allows Archivists, Designers and Developers to share a common language when discussing and planning the implementation of a digital archive and what that archive should do, not how it should be designed.

…

The task ahead of the Orbital Team is to consider how our on-going [system] designs relate to the OAIS functional model.

In particular, Joss points to the OAIS Function Cards produced by Cornell and Göttingen State Universities.  These are allowing the Orbital project to ‘tick off’ high level and more detailed OAIS functions in their system design.

Joss ends the blog: ‘I’d be very interested to hear from other MRD projects that are looking at the OAIS standard in detail, as well as people from earlier projects that have been through this process before.’  Please get in touch with him on the Orbital Blog.

Within the current JISCMRD programme, the MaRDI Gross Project is focussing on the OAIS model, in a slightly different, but hopefully complementary way.

The Managing Research Data – Gravitational Waves Project produced, inter alia, two key recommendations:

1. Funders should simply require that a project develop a high-level DMP as a suitable profile of the OAIS specification.
2. Funders should support projects in creating per-project OAIS profiles which are appropriate to the project and meet funders strategic priorities and responsibilities.

The MaRDI-Gross project therefore, will develop an intellectual ‘toolkit’ which will be supporting infrastructure for project-specific DMP planning, built on the OAIS model.  The project argues that ‘the data-management systems for projects of this scale are essentially always bespoke, so that there is no useful way in which software or ‘tick-list’ components can be provided for DMP planning in this space. The ‘kit’ must instead be a set of documentary resources targeted at technical managers and engineers.’

The likely structure for the toolkit will be:

1. Overviews of the OAIS methodology and goals
2. Indications of the state of the art in OAIS application, validation and auditing.
3. (References to) Backup documentation including the OAIS specification and selected developments or applications of it.
4. Case-studies of existing DMP efforts in existing projects.
5. Costing models for DMP planning, to the extent that this is feasible and useful.

Further information is provided in a brief MaRDI-Gross-Requirements document and (soon) at the MaRDI-Gross site.

The project also aims to develop material tailored for use by funding organisations in the development of policy and guidelines, as well as assessment materials for funders and reviewers.

The project has suffered a few delays, but is aiming to deliver a draft or strawman version by the significant date of Tuesday 21 February.  Watch this space!

There was a breakout group at the Programme Launch Workshop on metadata standards: for blogged accounts of this session, see http://researchdataessex.posterous.com/metadata-session-feedback-mrd-2011-13-program and http://sonexworkgroup.blogspot.com/2011/12/thematic-parallel-session-on-metadata.html

The Metadata Breakout Group came up with some actions, though these are reported a little differently on the two blogged accounts…:

1. Louise [Corti] would take a first pass at a grid template and send this round for comment
2. Projects working in similar domains to consult each other about the use of metadata, early on
3. Simon [Hodson] to organise a Programme meeting to be held in early Spring 12 to discuss metadata further and gain some agreement.

Or…

• Trying to locate (or otherwise collect) an already existing registry of metadata standards for different disciplines, in order to offer researchers from a given discipline an already tested metadata schema they can re-use,
• Mapping metadata standards to each other aiming to produce a minimum-sufficient-information metadata set that may be widely applicable accross disciplines,
• Taking steps towards organising a workshop in order to have metadata issues discussed among relevant stakeholders. ANDS Metadata Workshop in 2010 might be a potential source of inspiration for this with all those discipline-based approaches to metadata standards. Proposed dates for this Metadata WS were spring-summer 2012.

Louise has sent me a template, and I confess – mea culpa – that it got buried for the time being. It is now available as JISCMRD Projects’ Metadata Usage.  It would be good if projects working in similar domains could build on this to share information about standards being used.  We should explore whether there is already an existing registry of metadata standards for different disciplines?  Does anyone know of such a thing?

I think it is very important for the programme as a whole develop convergence upon ‘a minimum-sufficient-information metadata set that may be widely applicable accross disciplines’ which may be used by the projects.  To work towards this end, there will be a programme workshop on aligning JISCMRD projects’ metadata strategies. I plan to organise this for May.

Both posts highlight areas of commonality and areas – mostly architectural and to do with the choice of repository or CRIS – where the projects differ.  These patterns doubtless play out across the programme too.  What the regional meeting allows – clearly – is for projects to meet without a great travel burden and perhaps on a regular basis.  I shall be very keen to hear of other and further initiatives like this.

Having attended the DCC’s Regional (East Midlands) Roadshow in Loughborough, Rachel Proudfoot of the Leeds Roadmap Project asks whether and where ‘there is a regional role in fostering a community of data management practice’.  Rachel P. makes a particularly pertinent point: ‘Maybe regionalism is not relevant in the research data management world – but we certainly see shared research projects across the White Rose Consortium and a regional approach does offer opportunities for exchange of experience: the question is whether this can/will/should translate into regional shared services – for example, computing and storage.’  Rachel would be grateful for your thoughts at the Roadmap blog.

Similarly, I’d very much like to encourage other JISCMRD projects to follow the South West example, if you see that as being useful.  Whether just for sharing ideas or exploring activities further along the collaboration continuum, I would like to hear what projects and institutions think about regional meetings and collaborations.

Bill Worthington from the #rdtk_herts project recently gave a lunchtime presentation at the University of Hertfordshire which provides a useful overview of the Research Data Toolkit Project.  There are sections covering the motivation, national and local policy contexts, benefits/impact and the projects approach and implementation which will be of interest to JISCMRD Projects and other interested parties.  Bill will be following this up with an account of the ‘thoughtful debate’ which his presentation provoked.  See the presentation at: http://research-data-toolkit.herts.ac.uk/2012/02/information-hertfordshire-lunchtime-presentation-on-rdm/

Over in Lincoln, Mansur Darlington from the Bath REDm-MED Project (and the ERIM Project from the previous programme) gave a detailed presentation about these projects to Orbital, which is also working in the area of engineering.  Paul Stainthorpe has described the ERIM work on understanding what is required for managing engineering research data as ‘embarrassingly good’: see https://twitter.com/#!/kevingashley/status/166868418245574656

Mansur’s presentation is very detailed and well worth looking at.  See in particular the second part with sections on the ERIM’s research (covering terminology, identifying objects and understanding relationships, key findings, etc) and the REDm-MED’s work (covering engineering research data management planning and execution).  There are useful slides covering DMP tasks and areas where guidance and support is required.  Finally, Mansur covers ‘key building blocks for practical data management’.  The presentation and some notes from Joss Winn are available at http://orbital.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/2012/02/07/building-on-the-erim-and-redm-med-projects/

The Grant Funding Call may be found on the JISC website at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/fundingopportunities/funding_calls/2012/01/0112%20DI.aspx

The deadline for submission is 12.00 noon on 16 March 2012.  Please consult the eligibility criteria carefully when considering whether to prepare a proposal.

The Managing Research Data Elements may be found under Appendix A which provides information about the objectives of the Managing Research Data Programme.  The specific Calls for Proposals are detailed as Appendices A1-A4.

These activities seek:

1. to encourage the publication of research data, and the integration of research data publication with other components of scholarly communications; and
2. to encourage the development of high quality training materials in research data management, targeted at various important stakeholders.

The summary details are as follows:

Innovative Data Publication (Appendix A1)

Projects to design and implement innovative technical models and organisational partnerships to encourage and enable publication of research data.

A total of £320,000 is available for this work.  JISC intends to fund 2-4 projects of between £80,000 and £150,000 per project.

Projects should start as soon as possible after 1 June 2012 and should finish and finalise deliverables by 31 July 2013.

Scoping a Service to Collate and Summarise Journal Research Data Policies (Appendix A2)

A feasibility study (augmented with the development of a pilot demonstrator and the analysis of a range of possible business models) for a potential service to provide knowledge of – and a ready source of information covering – the journal policy landscape for research data.

A total of £90,000 is available for a single project to undertake this work.

The project should start as soon as possible after 1 June 2012 and should finish and finalise deliverables by the end of November 2012.

Research Data Management Training Materials (Appendix A3)

Projects to design, pilot and test training materials for research data management adapted for the needs of:

1. discipline-focussed post-graduate courses, and researcher professional development;
2. discipline liaison librarians;
3. research support roles, including dedicated data managers.

A total of £300,000 is available for 5-8 projects of between £30,000 and £60,000 per project.

The projects should start as soon as possible after 1 June 2012 and should finish and finalise deliverables by 31 May 2013.

Training Materials Support and Synthesis Role (Appendix A4)

A support project for the above activity, to assist projects in following best practice, ensure reusability, engage stakeholders and synthesise outcomes.

A total of £80,000 is available for a single project to undertake this work.

The project should start as soon as possible after 1 June 2012 and should finish and finalise deliverables by 31 July 2013.

Further Information and an Opportunity to Discuss the Call

*There will be no briefing event for this Call.* Any enquiries about the Managing Research Data elements of the 01/12 Call for Proposals should be directed to me (Simon Hodson, the Programme Manager responsible for this area of activity: s.hodson@jisc.ac.uk, 07545 524 009).

I have specifically put aside the following days (Fri 10 Feb; Thu 23 Feb; Wed 29 Feb; Thu 1 Mar) to field any enquiries and for telephone discussions of the objectives and possible proposals.

Anyone wishing to discuss any feature of the Managing Research Data elements of the Call with me on these days is requested to select a slot on the is Google spreadsheet: http://bit.ly/jiscmrd-12-01-Call-Chats (in case the bit.ly degrades, the URL is https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AoaHWqA_UJNhdHFhN29Qb3dkVU1sWGxUb21EbmsxZ1E&hl=en_US#gid=0

Please leave your name, institution and contact details if possible, in the spreadsheet at your desired time.  If you prefer not to leave contact details, please at least leave your name and I shall simply expect you to call me at the time indicated on 07545524009 or 0203 006 6071

If for any reason you are these dates are not convenient, you may contact me to arrange another appointment.  I would be grateful if you could check my calendar in doing so: http://bit.ly/simonhodson99-calendar

I very much hope that these area of activity will strike a chord and there will be strong interest in the Managing Research Data elements of the 12-01 JISC Grant Funding Call.

Many of the projects are agreed in the nature of one of the principal challenges: it is to ensure that the data management plan is a practical, helpful document supporting researchers in the completion of necessary tasks/actions rather than a long-winded box-ticking compliance exercise.

For example, from the History DMP Project at the University of Hull:

‘Our Project Proposal and the subsequent Plan indicated that we would base our document on the well-known DCC  ’Checklist for a Data Management Plan’, and we shall.  However, it has become clear to us (if we hadn’t realised it already) that in its basic form it is unsuited to use by the average academic.  We intend to use the DCC checklist as the basis for a document that is more directly relevant to (in this case) history research and which not only poses questions but also offers some answers – perhaps in the sense of ‘tick boxes’ and the like but also by pointing users to people locally who might offer answers or advice and services.  The aim is to make our document obviously relevant and useful rather than an unnecessary chore that has to be dealt with.’

This point has been echoed by the DATUM in Action Project.  On the DATUM in Action blog, Sue Childs relays the typical concern of researchers that ‘completing a DMP was a demanding task, and that for many projects researchers would feel that the effort and time required for a DMP could be better spent on conducting the research itself. Projects are funded from a range of sources (most of which do not currently require DMPs), and vary in size from small scale, single researcher projects to large scale, multiple-researcher projects.’  Sue suggests that if DMPs are to become mandatory, or if the practice of developing and maintaining a DMP during the research process is to be embedded then ‘DMP-lite templates will be necessary’.  To help move towards this goal the DATUM in Action project has been cross-referencing elements.  They have also added a front page so elements can be seen at a glance.  Sue suggests that automatic population of elements would also be helpful.

Appropriately, given the name of the project, they have also modified the DMP to provide ‘space for noting actions that needed to be taken: making the DMP a living document’.  This, as I understand it, is particularly important for the DATUM in Action Project which is working with researchers dealing with sensitive and personal data: the DMP needs to be (as Sue says) ‘a living document’ which prescribes and logs a set of data management related actions, some of which are conducted in compliance with ethical requirements.

Interestingly, Sue observes that ‘the EU Project researchers [with whom the DATUM in Action project is working] have already benefitted from the DMP process as they have learnt new aspects about managing their research data and records.’  To my mind, this recalls the dictum of US General and President Dwight D. Eisenhower, oft quoted by Kevin Ashley, that ‘plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.’ (See various form of this at http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dwight_D._Eisenhower).

Strand A: Research Data Management Infrastructure

Research Data Management Infrastructure: Institutional Pilot Projects

ADMIRe (A Data Management Infrastructure for Research), University of Nottingham

Poster to be made available.

Data.bris, University of Bristol

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://data.blogs.ilrt.org/2011/11/30/data-bris-poster-at-jisc-mrd-launch/

#idcc11 poster: http://data.blogs.ilrt.org/2011/12/04/data-bris-at-idcc-11/

Iridium, University of Newcastle

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://iridiummrd.wordpress.com/2011/12/01/poster-for-jisc-mrd02-start-up-meeting-in-nottingham/

Leeds RoaDMaP, University of Leeds

Poster to be made available.

Orbital, University of Lincoln

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://orbital.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/2011/11/22/introductory-poster/

Pilot Study in Health & Life Sciences, University of the West of England

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://www1.uwe.ac.uk/library/usingthelibrary/servicesforresearchers/datamanagement/managingresearchdata/projectoutputs.aspx

Research360, University of Bath

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://www.scribd.com/doc/74251322/Research360-Poster

Research Data @ Essex, University of Essex

Poster to be made available.

Service Oriented Toolkit for Research Data Management, University of Hertfordshire

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://research-data-toolkit.herts.ac.uk/2011/11/mrd-programme-launch-poster/

Research Data Management Infrastructure: Institutional Embedding and Transition to Service Projects

DaMaRO (Data Management Roll-out at Oxford), University of Oxford

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://blogs.oucs.ox.ac.uk/damaro/2011/11/24/poster-for-the-jisc-mrd-meeting/

DataPool, University of Southampton

Poster to be made available.

MiSS (MaDaM into Sustainable Service), University of Manchester

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://www.dcc.ac.uk/webfm_send/588

Open Exeter, University of Exeter

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://blogs.exeter.ac.uk/openexeterrdm/files/2012/01/Poster1.pdf

Research Data Management Infrastructure: Disciplinary Projects

KAPTUR, University for the Creative Arts

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://kaptur.wordpress.com/2011/11/28/kaptur-poster-2011/

PIMMS (Portable Infrastructure for the Metafor Metadata System), University of Reading

Poster to be made available.

SWORD-ARM (SWORD & Archaeological Research data Management), University of York

Poster to be made available.

Research Data Management Infrastructure: Metadata

CERIF for Datasets, University of Sunderland

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://cerif4datasets.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/c4d-project-poster/

Strand B: Research Data Management Planning Projects

DATUM in Action, University of Northumbria

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/re/isrc/themes/rmarea/datum/action/

DMSPpsych, University of Sheffield

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://62.255.174.175/pm_downloads/sheffield/dmsppsych_2011_flyer.pdf

History DMP, University of Hull

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://historydmp.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/history-dmp-poster/

MaRDI-Gross, University of Lancaster

Poster to be made available.

REDM-MED (Research Data Management for Mechanical Engineering Departments), University of Bath

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop / #idcc11 Conference poster: http://opus.bath.ac.uk/27864/1/redm0pos111123mjd11.pdf

REWARD (Researchers using Existing Workflows to Archive Research Data), University College London

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/reward/documents/reward-poster-dec-2011

ROHRD (Rapid Organisation of Health Research Data), Imperial College London

Poster to be made available.

Sustainable Management of Digital Music Research Data, Queen Mary University of London

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://rdm.c4dm.eecs.qmul.ac.uk/sites/default/files/smdmrd_launch_poster.pdf

Strand C: Enhancing DMPonline Projects

DMP-SS (Data Management Planning for Secure Services), University College London

#jiscmrd Launch Workshop poster: http://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/dmp-ss/files/2012/01/DMP-SS_Poster_Dec2011_Stelios-A0.png

Oxford DMPonline, University of Oxford

Poster to be made available.

The policy includes the policy document supported by a series of user guides to smooth implementation. It would be premature to describe the specifics of the policy here, although broadly it covers a researcher’s responsibilities, IPR, storage, retention, disposal and access, as well as setting out contextual issues such as purpose, objectives, and definitions.  My viewpoint on reading the draft policy is to anticipate how a researcher might respond to it in terms of clarity of actions, options and consequences. In this respect it is noticeable how much the policy has improved through review and iterations. …

We do not expect the policy to be without issues when it comes to implementation, clearly, for an initiative of this scale, but the policy will give the DataPool Project the basis to investigate and resolve the issues, in terms of actions and answers. On current schedule, there should be a year for the project to work with this.

There is little prior art on institutional data policy, and one of the reasons JISC has funded DataPool is not just to help produce a data policy, but to inform other institutions on implementation. … Policy implementation, monitoring and ability to adapt are the real testing ground for this latest phase of research data management projects.

Steve also engages in an interesting discussion on what should be defined as research data.  More precisely, perhaps it is a discussion of what research data should be subject to the requirements of research data policies to be retained and made available.  To my mind there are two criteria.  First, as Steve recognises the need to retain those data which underpin, provide evidence for, research findings as expressed in publications, that is research data ‘concerned with the quality and reproducibility of results, the bedrock of scientific testability’.  This is the most straightforward selection criteria.

Secondly, however, is the criteria of ‘reusability’ or ‘re-usefulness’ as Mansur Darlington will have it.  This is where the data collected may not necessarily underpin a publication – though it would be surprising if it didn’t – but for which there may be a value proposition in reuse in a number of ways.

There is likely a considerable overlap between these two criteria – but we should allow, I think, a) that some data is collected as part of a corpus susceptible to multiple analysis (time dependent observational data, archaeological digs, social surveys etc); and b) that many research projects will collect data that remains, somehow or other on the cutting room floor when publications are being prepared, but may have value in the longer term.

These are very general and abstract comments.  I would be very keen to understand whether JISCMRD projects are reaching in a more concrete and ‘empirical’ definition of a) what researchers understand by research data, and b) what research data the project and institution concludes should be subject to retention and availability policies.