Data Management
Contact matthew.mceniry@ttu.edu for any questions about these repositories.
Data Management Plan (DMP) Components
Topics to cover in a written plan include:
- Description of the project: e.g., purpose of the research, organizations and staff involved
- Description of the data to be collected: e.g., the nature and format of the data, how it will be collected, and overview of secondary data available on the topic
- Standards to be applied for formats, metadata, etc.
- Plans for short-term storage and data management: e.g., file formats, local storage and back up procedures, and security
- Legal and ethical issues: e.g., intellectual property, confidentiality of study participants
- Access policies and provisions: i.e., how will you make it available to others, any restrictions needed, etc.
- Provisions for long-term archiving and preservation: e.g., in a data archive
- Assigned data management responsibilities: i.e., which persons will actually be responsible for ensuring data management; how will compliance with this plan be monitored and ensured over time?
For a more complete list of things that you want to consider in managing your data, see the data planning checklist from the MIT libraries.
Texas Tech also offers access to the DMP Tool resource.
Guidelines for Social Science Data Plans
The Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) provides the following guidelines for data preparation and planning in the Social Sciences.
Federal Funding Agencies: Data Management and Sharing Policies
NEH does not have an official data management and sharing policy.
NEH's Office of Digital Humanities (ODH) requires data management plans for their new grant program - Digital Humanities Implementation Grants (DHG)
"Investigators are expected to share with other researchers, at no more than incremental cost and within a reasonable time, the primary data, samples, physical collections and other supporting materials created or gathered in the course of work under NSF grants. Grantees are expected to encourage and facilitate such sharing."
"Proposals submitted to NSF must include a supplementary document of no more than two pages labeled 'Data Management Plan'. This supplementary document should describe how the proposal will conform to NSF policy on the dissemination and sharing of research results."
Specific program guidance:
- Biological Sciences Directorate (BIO)
- Directorate-wide Guidance
- Environmental Research & Education(ERE)
- Computer & Information Science & Engineering Directorate (CISE)
- Directorate-wide Guidance
- Large Data Sets
- Mathematical and Physical Sciences Directorate (MPS)
- Division of Astronomical Sciences
- Division of Chemistry
- Division of Materials Research
- Division of Mathematical Sciences
- Division of Physics
- Engineering Directorate (ENG)
- Directorate-wide Guidance
- Division of Earth Sciences
- Integrated Ocean Drilling Program
- Division of Ocean Sciences
- Directorate for Education & Human Resources: Division of Undergraduate Education
- Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorate (SBE)
- Data Archiving Policy for the Division of Social and Economic Sciences (SES)
New extramural and intramural research programs require DMPs.
- "These data management plans will, at a minimum, describe how the researcher(s) will provide for long-term preservation of, and access to, the digital scientific data created by the proposed study." (pg 18).
- Researchers can also explain in the DMP, why long-term preservation is not applicable.
- Data management plans should include clear plans for sharing research data (pg 19).
All USDA-funded researchers will be required to comply with USDA's policy for making the digital data underlying the conclusions of peer-reviewed scientific research publications freely available in public repositories in machine readable formats.
Abridged from Tufts University Data Management Research Guide - Data Management Plans & Requirements page.
