Identifying new roles for academic libraries in supporting data-intensive research

Abstract

Reacting to the appearance of data-intensive research prompts academic libraries to become service providers for scholars, who work with research data. Although this is an imperative for libraries worldwide, due to the differences between countries and institutions, the level of readiness to engage in related activities differs from country to country. While some of the related tasks are fairly novel, others heavily build on librarians’ traditional, well-known skills. To identify these tasks, as well as making an inventory of the required skills and abilities, this paper, based on a non-exhaustive review of the recent literature, presents both theoretical and practical issues. It is demonstrated that the most obvious directions of the service development in academic libraries to support data-intensive science are research data management, data curation, data literacy education for users, and data literacy education for librarians.

Kebijakan Open Data Penelitian dalam Membangun Komunikasi Ilmiah di Perpustakaan Lembaga Riset

“…Mengacu pada pendapat Hosain et all ( 2016) bahwa komunikasi ilmiah yang dibangun atas dukungan perpustakaan lewat open data penelitian dapat meningkatkan aksesibilitas data penelitian, mengurangi duplikasi dan menghemat biaya. Koltay (2019) peneliti membutuhkan dukungan terkait data untuk seluruh siklus hidup data penelitian mulai dari perencanaan, pengorganisasian, pendokumentasian, berbagi, dan pelestarian kumpulan data. Mereka juga dapat meminta nasihat tentang hak cipta, masalah perizinan dan kekayaan intelektual.…”

Open research data in African academic and research libraries: a literature analysis

“…Kennedy (2019) outlines in her report on research libraries as “catalytic leaders in a society in constant change” and that one of their new roles will be to engage in data science education both for librarians and users. Data literacy is seen as a foundational skill for all kinds of researchers, students and librarians (Koltay, 2019). Various approaches are being developed to enable librarians to catch up with the new demands of data management.…”

“…While data librarianship and data science are two distinct professions in the endeavours to manage research, the two are complimentary and are required to make the RDM environment a success. Koltay (2019, p. 100) distinguishes the differences between the two but points out that data science methods and practices “may turn out to be applicable to data librarianship, especially in regard to analytical and statistical services, data visualization, programming languages and their logic”.…”

“…Data curation highlights the importance of data, and African libraries should focus on its re-usability because as Koltay (2019, p. 99) points out “the value of data is its extrinsic properties – their fitness for use”. The cost of research in Africa is extensively high, and the lack of adequate infrastructure should be a driving force in valuing data and its re-use, and hence where resources permit, working infrastructures should be set up.…”

Research data management in selected East African libraries: A survey

“…These developments have introduced new research terminologies, such as Research 2.0 and eScience. Within this evolving landscape, research data management (RDM) has emerged as a critical aspect of modern research (Koltay, 2020).…”