Required Data Management Training for Graduate Students in an Earth and Environmental Sciences Department

Bonnie Fong,Minglu Wang

doi:10.7191/jeslib.2015.1067

Abstract

The increasing importance of data management in the sciences has led the Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences at a research intensive university to work closely with the Physical Sciences Librarian and Data Services Librarian on campus to provide mandatory training to its graduate students. Although integrating data management training into the graduate program curriculum may not be possible, there are still opportunities to ensure students learn such skills prior to graduating. This article describes the four approaches taken thus far — a seminar about basic data management during the department’s weekly seminar series, creation of a Data Profile form that students were asked to complete, an interactive workshop during the department’s annual retreat, and assistance with writing data management plans. Buy-in for requiring data management training was essential from both faculty and students and was possible because both groups understood the value of research data management skills. Also vital to the success of these approaches was how the subject specialist and data librarians leveraged their respective areas of expertise in a complementary fashion to address disciplinary as well as broader data-related concerns.

Highlights

Growing interest in research data from funding agencies, publishers, and higher-education institutions have led researchers and the librarians who support them to contemplate current practices of data management and to seek methods for improving them
Faculty advisors may be the visionaries, grant writers, and authors of data management plans, but graduate students are the ones collecting much of the data and managing the daily operations in the laboratory
On the research intensive Rutgers University – Newark campus, the Research Office and the John Cotton Dana Library pay close attention to the growing need for data management training. They began co-sponsoring research data management workshops for faculty, oftentimes including discussion about the National Science Foundation (NSF) Data management plans (DMPs) requirement. It was the announcement for one of these workshops in fall 2011 that caught the eye of the Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences’ (DEES) graduate program director

Summary

Introduction

Growing interest in research data from funding agencies, publishers, and higher-education institutions have led researchers and the librarians who support them to contemplate current practices of data management and to seek methods for improving them. Faculty advisors may be the visionaries, grant writers, and authors of data management plans, but graduate students are the ones collecting much of the data and managing the daily operations in the laboratory. This article discusses how the authors (a Physical Sciences Librarian and Data Services Librarian) are meeting the data training needs of graduate students in one particular science department on their campus by bringing to the collaboration their individual areas of expertise. It describes the four approaches taken far to ensure students in the department will be data information literate prior to degree completion

Background

Summary