Research Data MANTRA

Stuart Macdonald, Robin Rice, Ҫuna Ekmekcioglu

EDINA & Data Library,University of Edinburgh

OER2011, Univ. Manchester, 12 May 2011

Partnership between:

• Edinburgh University Data Library

• Institute for Academic Development

Grounded in three disciplinary contexts: social science, clinical psychology and geoscience

Aims to develop online interactive open learning resources for PhD students and early career researchers that will:

• Raise awareness of the key issues related to research data management

• Provide guidelines for good practice

Project overview

Why manage research data?

Data Deluge – exponential growth in the volume of digital research

artifacts created within academia

Data management is one of theessential areas of responsible conduct of research.

By managing your data you will:

• Meet funding body grant requirements.

• Ensure research integrity and replication.

• Ensure research data and records are accurate, complete, authentic and reliable.

• Increase your research efficiency.• Enhance data security and

minimise the risk of data loss.• Prevent duplication of effort by

enabling others to use your data.

Eight units with activities, scenarios and videos:

• Research data explained• Data management plans• Organising data• File formats and transformation• Documentation and metadata• Storage and security• Data protection, rights and access• Preservation, sharing and licensing

Four data handling practicalsSPSS, NVivo, R, ArcGIS

Xerte Online Toolkits – University of Nottingham

Online learning module

Online learning module• Delivered online – self-paced, available ‘anytime, anyplace’• Emphasis on practical experience and active engagement via

online activities• One hour per unit• Read and work through scenarios & activities (incl. videos etc)• CC licence to allow manipulation of content for re-use with

attribution• Portable content in open standard formats (e.g. SCORM)

Progress to date• Needs assessment

– Completed

• Authoring content – Completed for 5 units (out of 8)

• Data handling practicals– Outlines & data sets agreed for

each – Internal reviews complete– 2nd revisions for wider review

ongoing

• Internal feedback on finished units– Completed

• User testing – Usability testing completed – 5

students

Video productions (prominent researchers with a ‘story to tell’): May - June

External Evaluation of materials - primary contacts,PhD students, colleagues from JISC MRD projects: May

User testing - complete module: June

External Evaluation of project by CHSS E-Learning consultant: June

Final modifications in the light of user feedback: July

Next steps …

Next steps …

Learning materials to be deposited with an open licence in JorumOpen and Xpert: August

Learning materials to be embedded in three participating postgraduate programmes and made available through Transkills programme for use by all postgraduate students and early career researchers: Next academic year

Time – underestimated!

Authoring content – not an easy task...

• Re-using existing materials vs writing from scratch

• Copyright – images, videos (where possible open or CC-licensed materials)

• Consistency in style, terminology, tempo

Setting up Xerte Online Toolkits (XOT) on the server

• Security issues

• Issues with the software

Lessons learned

Lessons learned

Working with a default XOT template• Limitations of the template

Difficulty finding volunteers for user testing

Issues with data handling practicals:

• Tension between data handling and data analysis in terms of actual content

• Ensuring clear explanation of software specific jargon/technical terminology/process-specific language

• Retaining consistency across four data handling practicals in terms of look and feel, flow, content, audience

Credits:

CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 image by ecstaticist courtesy of Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/photos/ecstaticist/1337749333/ CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 image by libraryman courtesy of Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/photos/libraryman/111606778/ CC BY-SA 2.0 image courtesy of Gideon Burton: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wakingtiger/4097835586/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 image by ken mccown courtesy of Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/waechor/371222259/CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 image by Jason Verwey courtesy of Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/photos/94382772@N00/5210633416/ CC BY 2.0 image by Sean McGrath courtesy of Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/mcgraths/3597037843/ CC BY 2.0 Image by laszlo-photo courtesy of Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/laszlo-photo/1899390628/ CC BY 2.0 image by Malkav courtesy of Flickr – http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2370/2262952280_0b03c07db9_o.jpgCC BY 2.0 image by M. M. Alvarez, T. Shinbrot, F. J. Muzzio, Rutgers University, Center for Structured Organic Composites  courtesy of Flickr –http://www.flickr.com/photos/11304375@N07/2326596014/CC BY-ND 2.0 images by Philippe Put courtesy of Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/34547181@N00/4203882645/sizes/z/in/photostream// CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 image by monkeyc.net courtesy of Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/monkeyc/216415962/

Project website:http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/data-library-projects/mantra

Project wiki:https://www.wiki.ed.ac.uk/display/mantra/Research+Data+Mantra+project+wiki

Institute for Academic Development: http://www.iad.ed.ac.uk/

Contact: stuart.macdonald@ed.ac.uk

THANK YOU!!