The IMLS Project Poster, presented during the Sunday evening and described with a number of emphatic gestures (as seen here).

The DataONE Users Group meeting in Chapel Hill, North Carolina just concluded, with representatives from data authors, institution support staff, data repositories and aggregators, and other stakeholders in attendance. The DataONE Users Group meeting provides a space for those in attendance to help guide DataONE’s initiatives to better meet their needs. This was a great opportunity to highlight the DMPTool development plans over the coming months, as well as the work we’re doing to provide librarians with high-impact resources for data management support.

The feedback we received with regards to the DMPTool was both extremely positive and useful. As the first step in the data management lifecycle, the DMPTool as a planning aid also serves as an excellent entry point for researchers to be made aware of the resources available at their institution. Arming librarians not only with educational resources such as our webinar series and upcoming promotional materials, but also examples of how others in their field have been active in data services is an effective way to fill the leadership gap in data management.

Several attendees mentioned that one of the key problems facing researchers is a lack of knowledge about data management requirements, best practices, and the support resources available through their institution. Whether its funder requirements, guidance on choosing one or more data repositories, or even the proper language to describe a data management plan, providing knowledge support to researchers during the grant writing period is a great way to demonstrate the librarian’s support role during operational implementation.

As we take this new feedback into account, we’ll continue to assemble useful resources not only for data management, but also DMPTool administration. If you weren’t able to make it out to the DUG meeting this year, the presentations are available at the DataONE User Group page. Feel free to drop us a line at uc3@ucop.edu or email me directly at daniel.phipps@ucop.edu – we’re always interested in new ways that the DMPTool can support the research community.

The poster we presented at the meeting is available on figshare: DOI 10.6084/m9.figshare.730643