Most of the campuses are shirking. Big surprise.

The University of Kansas (KU) Libraries has a new organizational structure that resulted in the creation of the Content Development Department, with fewer librarians dedicated to stewardship of the Libraries’ collections. The impending retirement of three long‐standing and knowledgeable librarians prompted a review of the responsibilities of the new department and identification of the human resources needed to meet the collection demands of a user‐centered library. In an effort to determine how the Libraries can proceed, we completed an environmental scan of current activities and identified, through the literature and contacts with academic colleagues, how collecting practices and formats will develop. Based on evidence gained through a survey of faculty and graduates students at KU, there is a strong sentiment that library resources need to be carefully managed to support the teaching and research needs of the university. This paper will discuss efforts to make a case to continue to support deep subject expertise for collection development, particularly in the arts and humanities. By clearly identifying collection development responsibilities (it’s not just buying books!), KU librarians were successful in transitioning into the new organizational structure with the staffing needed to make knowledgeable collection development decisions.

Guest If you thought you were ready for data science but you're not, don't put your new data science hire into a different role or block them as they keep trying to be successful. Be honest and let them go.

Good stuff on risk management.

Notes on hiring and being hired as a data librarian. By "Alexis Johnson."

Objective: To describe three tiers of research data support services that emerged from national environmental scanning of data management needs and activities. Setting: The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst) is a top fifty recipient of NSF funding, with the agency providing over 40% of the University’s sponsored research, and is classified as a Research University with Very High research activity by the Carnegie Foundation. After determining a need for data management services, a library Data Working Group per-formed national environmental scanning. Environmental scanning used public information available from 18 UMass Amherst peer and model institutions to determine the range of data management and curation services that are available to various research communities. Methods: Environmental scanning activities include a web audit. Results: National practices demonstrate a wide range of potential data management services. UMass Amherst’s Data Working Group has generalized data management services into three tiers, creating a useful rubric for determining one’s current service level and for setting goals to meet the needs of one’s research community. Conclusions: The Tiers of Research Data Support Services, generalized from local needs and national activities, describe different levels of support of increasing cost and involvement scales for supporting researchers’ data management and curation needs: education, consultation, and infrastructure.

As the need for research data management grows, many libraries are considering adding data services to help with the research mission of their institution. The Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Libraries created a position and hired a director of research data management in September 2013. The position was new to the libraries and the university. With the backing of the library administration, a plan for building relationships with VCU faculty, researchers, students, service and resource providers, including grant administrators, was developed to educate and engage the community in data management plan writing and research data management training.

The following is a guest post by Jody DeRidder, Head of Digital Services at the University of Alabama Libraries.  This post reports on efforts in the digital preservation community that align with the Library’s Digital Preservation Outreach & Education (DPOE) Program. Jody, among many other accomplishments, has completed one of the DPOE Train-the-Trainer workshops and […]

There is a scarcity of practical guidance for developing data services in an academic library. Data services, like many areas of research, require the expertise and resources of teams spanning many disciplines. While library professionals are embedded into the teaching activities of our institutions, fewer of us are embedded in research activities occurring across the full life cycle. The significant challenges of managing, preserving, and sharing data for reuse demand that we take a more active role. Providing support for funder data management plans is just one option in the data services landscape. Awareness of the institutional and library culture in which we operate places an emphasis on the importance of relationships. Understanding the various cultures in which our researchers operate is crucial for delivering data services that are relevant and utilized. The goal of this article is to guide data specialists through this landscape by providing key resources and strategies for developing locally relevant services and by pointing to active communities of librarians and researchers tackling the challenges associated with digital research data.

The management of research data is now a major challenge for research organisations. Vast quantities of born-digital data are being produced in a wide variety of forms at a rapid rate in universities. This paper analyses the contribution of academic libraries to research data management (RDM) in the wider institutional context. In particular it: examines the roles and relationships involved in RDM, identifies the main components of an RDM programme, evaluates the major drivers for RDM activities, and analyses the key factors influencing the shape of RDM developments. The study is written from the perspective of library professionals, analysing data from 26 semi-structured interviews of library staff from different UK institutions. This is an early qualitative contribution to the topic complementing existing quantitative and case study approaches. Results show that although libraries are playing a significant role in RDM, there is uncertainty and variation in the relationship with other stakeholders such as IT services and research support offices. Current emphases in RDM programmes are on developments of policies and guidelines, with some early work on technology infrastructures and support services. Drivers for developments include storage, security, quality, compliance, preservation, and sharing with libraries associated most closely with the last three. The paper also highlights a ‘jurisdictional’ driver in which libraries are claiming a role in this space. A wide range of factors, including governance, resourcing and skills, are identified as influencing ongoing developments. From the analysis, a model is constructed designed to capture the main aspects of an institutional RDM programme. This model helps to clarify the different issues involved in RDM, identifying layers of activity, multiple stakeholders and drivers, and a large number of factors influencing the implementation of any initiative. Institutions may usefully benchmark their activities against the data and model in order to inform ongoing RDM activity.