Data Management Planning: what do researchers really need to know?
Scoping digital repository services
for research data management 20 October, Oxford
Louise CortiUK Data Archive
University of Essex
Overview
• Introduction • Objectives of large scale Research Programme• Data Management Policy• Operating the Policy (getting tough)• Role of the UKDA • Outputs• Challenges
Rural Economy and Land Use Programme (RELU)
The Research Programme is a large-scale unprecedented interdisciplinary collaboration between:
• Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)• Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
(BBSRC)• National Environment Research Council (NERC)
The programme has a budget of £24 million, with additional funding provided by government agencies:
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA)
Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department
Programme Objectives
• Rural areas in the UK are experiencing considerable change
• The Rural Economy and Land Use Programme (RELU) aims to advance understanding of the challenges they face
• Interdisciplinary research is being funded 2004-2009 in order to inform future policy and practice with choices on how to manage the countryside and rural economies
• The Rural Economy and Land Use Programme enables researchers to work together to investigate the social, economic, environmental and technological challenges faced by rural areas
• The Programme aims to encourage social and economic vitality of rural areas and promote the protection and conservation of the rural environment
Six societal challenges
• public trust in food chains
• tackling animal and plant disease
• sustainable farming in the New Europe
• robust rural economics
• land management techniques to deal with climate change and invasive species
• managing land and water use for sustainable water catchments
Themes and data
• The Integration of Land and Water Use • The Environmental Basis of Rural Development • Sustainable Food Chains• Economic and Social Interactions with the Rural
Environment
• Programme is both using and creating a variety of data sources
• disparate types of data – social and environmental and biological data
• estimate some 80 datasets from Call 1 (8 major research projects and smaller scoping studies)
RELU data types
• Social data – people based• Micro (survey)
• Household or individual level attributes, Behaviour, attitudes and options
• Business/company• Farm level data• Aggregated
• UK Census e.g. small area statistics, Retail statistics, Health indicators
• GIS/spatial data geographically referenced environmental databases• Ordnance survey, Road networks, Settlement
RELU data types (cont.)
• water quality, land fill, air quality, emission levels
• soil data, eg mineral composition
• ecological data, animal and bird distributions
• agricultural census
• climate and meteorological data
• river flow data
• biochemical data relating to foods/habitats
RELU Data Management Policy
• Early on data management formally recognised by funders as critical
• builds on existing ESRC and NERC mandatory data policies
• aims to enhance the capabilities for interdisciplinarity and thus improves the ability of the research community to:
• apply learning from one field to another • combine different methodological approaches and
sources of information • cross-fertilise ideas and concepts • understand scientific, technological and environmental
problems in their social and economic contexts
www.relu.ac.uk/about/data.htm
Data Management Policy principles
• publicly funded research data are a valuable, long term resource
• to ensure maximum research exploitation data must be managed effectively from day-1
• researchers must collect data in such a way as to ensure longer term sharing
• RELU funds will support data management through the life of the project
• data must be made available by researchers for archiving: Research Council supported data centres provide long-term, post-project data management
RELU Data Support Service
• set up to help oversee and implement the Programme's Data Management Policy and Data Management Plan
• provides a support service for RELU researchers and staff to gain information and guidance on issues surrounding longer-term data sharing and preservation
• joint support service run by:
• ESRC/JISC supported UK Data Archive at Essex (UKDA)
• The NERC-supported Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH)
• funded initially for one year supporting one FTE and outreach activities: 1 Jan 05 – 31 Dec 05. Continuation to March 2008
Outputs
• Getting wording of DM Plan and guidance right
• Web site to support completing application
• Web site to support completing plan once funded
• Workshops for new Principal Investigators
• Workshops for new researchers
• Best Practice Guide on Data Management
• Third party data information – costs, barriers, licensing
• Database of all data being created
• Acquire data, process and disseminate data
• Advice on data integration
Data Management Plan
• proforma to complete (Section 3 of the Project Communication and Data Management Plan)
• highlighting data management and custody issues at an early stage
• providing a basis for quality assurance within the Programme
• providing a basis from which award holders and the Programme Director can report and monitor project and overall RELU Programme progress
Information required from plan
• requirements for access to existing datasets
• details of new and derived datasets to be produced
• quality assurance of data
• formats and standards
• data description and documentation
• ethical, legal issues and IPR resolution
• data back-up procedures, security
• archiving data (for Research Council data archives)
• data management representative
RELU-DSS helps support these areas
Guidance on Data Management
• Produced glossy brochure
• What is Data Management? Data, metadata etc.
• Data Management strategies
• What is Digital Preservation?
• Making Back-ups
• Format Translation and Choice of Formats
• Security
Our experience
• This degree of formalisation is new to social science data in the UK
• UKDA operate a Datasets Policy for Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) but with less leverage upfront
• DMP and DM support ensures potential sharing issues to be clarified early on and support mid and end of project
• Greater awareness of data, metadata documentation, and data sharing….albeit grudgingly
• Integration of data is key for this programme
Other disciplines (UK) Policies
• Natural Environmental Research Council (6% of each Programme)
• Arts and Humanities Research Council ICT review (AHDS History)
• Biological Sciences Research Council NEW!
• Medical Research Council STILL WAITING!
• We hope to see DMPs applied to all major investment data-rich ESRC programmes
Data management and sharing advice and training
• Web site
• Joint council brochure
• Bespoke advisory service
• Training workshops
• Training materials
• Articles
Sharing options
Advice on:
• ARCHIVING DATA AT THE UKDA • Formalised archiving and preservation of data in a
specialist data archive or centre that ensures the long-term secure safekeeping of and access to data
• SELF-ARCHIVING • UKDA established its self-archiving facility, UKDA-
store, in 2008, with support from ESRC and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). ‘Quicker and dirtier’ solution
Modular
• aiming at specific and easy-to-read information
• to provide day creators/managers with best practice strategies and methods for creating a shareable dataset.
• relevant throughout the life span of a research project - from the initial award application, through the data creation phase to the end of the active research phase.
• modularised:
• How to share data• Consent, confidentiality and ethics• Copyright and other rights• Data description and metadata• Data formats and software• Data storage, back-up and security
Messages• data are valuable resources that can be used and re-used for future scientific and
educational purposes
• sharing data facilitates research often beyond the scope of the original research, encourages scientific inquiry, avoids duplicate data collection and provides resources for education and training
• the ability to demonstrate continued usage of data after the original research is completed ensures that the research community gets the most out of publicly funded research.
• many research councils are now committed to a long-term strategy for data resource provision and for supporting UK researchers. The following have data policies:
• ESRC Data Policy (operated by ESDS at UKDA)• British Academy • The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)• Medical Research Council (MRC)• Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)• Wellcome Trust
• UKDA has years of expertise in implementing and training in best practices in data management and methods of data sharing
• most research data can be shared with other researchers!
Informing of options or data sharing
• Options:
• informally, via the data creator, on a peer-to-peer basis
• deposit in a specialist data centre, dedicated to archiving, preserving and disseminating digital data
• deposit in a self-archiving system
• deposit in an institutional repository
• Set out pros and cons for complex research data
FAQs
• Answers to key questions on consent , confidentiality and anonymisation
• Most problematic areas:
• definitions and legal aspects• gaining consent • consent forms • disclosure • data sharing and confidentiality
Workshops
• Format - half to one day per module• Group size max = 20 with 2 facilitators
• Example:
• Morning: dealing with confidential research information and consent agreements in research with people as participants (interviews, questionnaires, focus groups and so on).
• Afternoon session focuses on metadata and data documentation for archiving data
Materials
• Powerpoint presentations
• Groups:• Short briefing• I. Exercises on consent. Discusssion• II. Exercises on anonymisation. Answers
• Group feedback and discussion
• Summary
Contacts
• Louise Corti
[email protected] Data ArchiveUniversity of EssexColchesterEssexwww.esds.ac.uk