Topic: Repository Requirements and Assessment

Overview:

To effectively preserve digital materials over time, institutions must meet a number of administrative, technological, and organizational requirements; the assessment process can inform repositories about their strengths and weaknesses in fulfilling those requirements. Assessment can take the form of a self-assessment, a review by peers, a more formal external evaluation, or some combination of approaches. By undertaking an assessment, an organization can improve its practices and demonstrate to the outside world its commitment to protecting its electronic collections and making them available in the long term.

Learning Objectives:

●Participants will be introduced to common elements of a repository assessment in order to identify the key areas of function and performance of a data repository.

●Participants will be able to identify several assessment tools for use in evaluating compliance to repository functions and performance and articulate their differences in order to determine which tool would best suit their environment and circumstances.

●Participants will learn about the experiences of ICPSR with repository assessment as a case study in order to be able to determine the benefits and costs of the assessment process.

Key Assessment Tools:

●Data Seal of Approval (DSA).

●Digital Repository Audit Method Based on Risk Assessment (DRAMBORA), Digital Curation Centre & DigitalPreservationEurope.

●Trusted Repositories Audit and Certification (TRAC).

○Trusted Repositories Audit and Certification: Criteria and Checklist, Center for Research Libraries (2007).

○Audit and Certification of Trustworthy Digital Repositories: Magenta Book (2011). )

●World Data System. Certification of World Data System Members.

●Network of Expertise in Long-term Storage of Digital Resources (NESTOR).

Key Readings:

●Establishing Trust in a Chain of Preservation: The TRAC Checklist Applied to a Data Staging Repository (DataStaR), Gail Steinhart, Dianne Dietrich and Ann Green, D-Lib Magazine (2009).

●Trust Through Self Assessment, Andrew McHugh, Data Curation Centre (2007).

●Foundations for a Successful Digital Preservation Program, Christy E. Allen, RLG DigiNews (2006).

●A Digital Decade: Where Have We Been and Where Are We Going in Digital Preservation?, Nancy Y. McGovern, RLG DigiNews (2009).

Curating and Managing Research Data for Re-Use workshop, ICPSR Summer Program 2013