Tag Archives: MANTRA

Commissioning data handling modules for MANTRA

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We are seeking to commission new software-specific data handling modules in the Research Data MANTRA training resource (https://mantra.ed.ac.uk/), as the ones there have become outdated (https://mantra.ed.ac.uk/softwarepracticals.html). The online modules have been refreshed more regularly by the Research Data Support team. There will be a short turnaround for the commissioned works, which will be incorporated into MANTRA and the Research Data Service.

There is £2,000 available per module for new modules to be authored by end of July, 2024.

Screenshot of the MANTRA resource

What are the software modules in DataShare?

As an extension to the overall MANTRA resource which covers good practice in research data management, each software module contains a one to one a half hour practical to work through which will teach skills needed to handle data properly within the software environment. It is not intended to be an introduction to the software, and a certain level of proficiency with the software may be assumed (any prerequisite knowledge should be stated).

Each module contains:

  • a PDF document stepping through the practical so the learner can work at their own pace;
  • and a publicly available dataset that can be used within the practical, such as a UK government dataset or an open access dataset from a repository. The dataset can be based in any discipline but should not require discipline-specific skills to understand and use.

Currently, we have a module for SPSS, R, ArcGIS and Nvivo.

How do I submit my proposal to author a software module?

We are interested in proposals for authoring accessible data handling tutorials in specific modern software environments, including potentially SPSS, R, Python, QGIS, and Nvivo.

To be considered for this commissioned work, please send a one to two page outline of what the practical will entail in a PDF document to R.Rice@ed.ac.uk by end of Friday 28th June, 2024. Interested parties are welcome to get in touch before the outline is complete, stating their intention. The outline must include the author’s name, email address, and postal address, with or without telephone number. The outline may also contain:

  • prerequisite knowledge that the learner is assumed to have in order to complete the module successfully, such as familiarity with a particular type of software or experience of coding;
  • specific learning objectives of what the learner will gain by working their way through the module;
  • headings indicating sections of the tutorial;
  • descriptions of what will be covered beneath each heading and what the learner is expected to do, using the software of interest;
  • a citation of the dataset to be used with the practical, including the name and location.

The commissioning process

The Research Data Support team will evaluate the proposals and select the authors to proceed with the commissioned works. Notification will be by email. Authors will be expected to comply with the University of Edinburgh’s terms and conditions for suppliers, which includes transfer of any IPR to the University. Upon evaluating the material, we may choose to make edits for purposes of clarity or accessibility. Current members of staff of the University may need to receive payment through their associated unit (to be determined).

All materials for the full software modules must be passed to the University by Friday 26th July. Progress before that date will be assessed through email correspondence. An invoice for work completed must be submitted after the team confirms the content is complete and to specification before 31 July in order to be paid in full.

Robin Rice
Data Librarian and Head of Research Data Support
Library and University Collections

Skills4EOSC fellowship

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This is a guest blog post from Clara Parente Boavida, about her fellowship with the Research Data Service as part of a European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) project.

My name is Clara Parente Boavida and I work in the Research Support Office at Iscte-Instituto Universitario de Lisboa (Portugal). I applied for the first call of the Skills4EOSC Fellowship Programme and between 11th March to 5th April I worked with an amazing team at Research Data Service at the University of Edinburgh.

The Skills4EOSC Fellowship Programme aims to address the need to promote and sustain professional roles dedicated to open research by supporting short-term secondments.

Among the three different types of fellowships, I have chosen a Research Data Support internship. This placement allowed me to actively participate in the day-to-day activities related to research data support, providing an immersive experience and a comprehensive understanding of research data management practices within the host institution.

I would like to congratulate the Skills4EOSC project for this initiative and thank everyone who has helped to make this opportunity possible. I’m grateful for the support of my institution (Vice-Rector Jorge Costa and Carina Cunha), I’m grateful to Robin Rice for the extraordinary welcome and I’m grateful to all the people I’ve had the opportunity to talk to and interact with during this month.

“the essential is invisible to the eyes”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s novel “The Little Prince”

Each week’s agenda was carefully prepared with my expectations and interests in mind. The University of Edinburgh has a busy life in terms of Research Data Management. Not only in collaboration with various services within the University, but also with the external community. This holistic view has made me reflect about the different services that Research Data Management intersects with. Success comes from healthy and effective relationships with different stakeholders.

Photo collage of Clara's activities in Edinburgh.

I was involved in the day-to-day activities of different members of the team, and each experience added something new. I had the opportunity to attend face-to-face events, one-to-one meetings, kick-off meetings, as well as online meetings and events. I also took part in internal team meetings and service meetings. Informal activities were carefully planned to allow the Research Data Service team to interact with each other and to allow other teams to be involved.

I had one-to-one meetings with each member of the Research Data Support team about: DataShare, DataVaut, training programme, DMP, DMPonline, Research Data Management Policy and Metrics. I had one-to-one meetings with members of other teams: Open Research, Scholarly Communications, Research Information Systems, Digital Research Services, and Edinburgh Research Office.

I attended a number of events in person: Digital Research Lunchtime Seminar: How to interpret and analyse your data efficiently; Open Research Scotland Meeting; Open Science Framework Workshop Modules 1, 2, 3 & 4; Ethics & Data Management at the Childlight GDF Residency; Technomoral Conversations: Who is Responsible for Responsible AI?; Library Tour for Staff, and Digital Research Lunchtime Seminar: Manage, publish, share and preserve.

I also participated in online events: Updating the DataCite Metadata Scheme webinar; UK Research Network (UKRN) webinar on Indicators for Open Research; UKRN Indicators Pilot 2 online meeting; UKRN Pilot 1 kick-off meeting; Writing a Data management plan, for the Health in Social Science School; and Working with Personal and Sensitive Data. I also had the opportunity to organise an online meeting with Mike Wallis (Research Services, IT Infrastructure) and the IT Services of Iscte to answer questions about DataStore.

In terms of personal contributions, I wrote suggestions for updates to MANTRA Unit 1, part of an open access Research Data Management Training course. I had the opportunity to demonstrate the interoperability process between CRIS systems and OpenAIRE, and also how to link EC funded projects to publications and datasets.

Finally, I designed a Research Data Management Roadmap for the Iscte. This roadmap intends to guide the work to be developed over the next three years towards the implementation of a RDM Service for the Iscte-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa. It incorporates lessons learned during the Skills4EOSC Fellowship Programme at the University of Edinburgh. It is also aligned with the Human Resources Excellence in Research Award (HRS4R) principles for researchers, which is a mechanism through which the European Commission seeks to ensure that concrete steps are put in place by institutions to enhance working conditions for researchers across Europe, as set out in the European Charter and Code.

New data archiving unit in MANTRA

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Summertime is always a good time to renew and refresh – including open educational resources like Research Data MANTRA, https://mantra.ed.ac.uk, a free online course “for those who manage digital data as part of their research project.”

MANTRA’s lead editor Bob Sanders, in Library Research Support, has been busy in between his summer holidays getting all the topical units fit for new postgrads and early career researchers.

In particular each of the units’ links, images, videos, activities and further reading sections have been renewed, following a rolling revamp of most of the sections’ written content over the last couple of years. Two of the units, ‘Files, formats and transformation,’ and ‘Documentation, metadata and citation’ have been retired and  replaced by a new ‘Preparing your data for archiving’ section, covering why and how to publish your data in a trustworthy repository.

We are also aware that the data handling tutorials, separate from the other units, have become more or less outdated and while we decide how to address this, users should be aware of the last update date on each set of those downloadable materials.

Of course we practice what we preach in terms of archiving, and so previous units that have been revamped have been archived on the Zenodo site, (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1035218), along with the retired ‘DIY RDM Training Kit for Librarians’ (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6532049).

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Bob for acting as lead editor for MANTRA in recent years and for stewarding it through so many new developments in the field of research data management, and to wish him well in his new role as SCADR Training Manager in the School of GeoSciences.

For the complete set of RDM training by the Research Data Service, including live sessions, see https://www.ed.ac.uk/is/data-training.

Robin Rice
Data Librarian and Head, Research Data Support

It Is Our Mantra

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Last week I was honoured to accept an invitation to speak at the Library Technology Conclave at Somaiya Vidyavihar University in Mumbai, India, organised by Informatics Limited and the University. A prelude the day before the event included a half-day “Research Data Management (RDM) Basics” tutorial for about 50 attending librarians, which I delivered based on adaptations of our Research Data Support team’s training materials for PhD students and staff. The training exercises, developed from a few other external librarian training sessions I’ve done, focused on building librarians’ confidence in supporting researchers with data management planning and data sharing. Doing the training in person helped me to overcome communication barriers and foster deeper engagement than could have happened online only.

Lighting the flame of the conference

Lighting the flame of the hybrid conference

The conference was on the theme of “Research Data Management and Stewardship: Building Blocks for Open Science,” with a number of eminent librarians, scientists, and educators speaking in keynotes and on panels in six thematic sessions, in-person and remotely. There was a palpable sense of urgency to the proceedings, as those in the room were concerned that India’s scientific institutions, without funder mandates, national open infrastructure, nor observable changes in cultural norms for RDM and Open Science, might be left behind, given this emerging new, more transparent way of conducting research. Questions focused not on the What or Why of Open Science, but how to instigate behavioural change of scientists and researchers, and how librarians could create demand for new services such as data repositories and quickly skill themselves up.

I have some empathy for their position. A decade or so ago I attended conferences which felt more like hand-wringing than change-making, with endless talk of carrots and sticks (and carrot-stick jokes), with researchers explaining over and again their reluctance to be ‘scooped’ by giving access to their data. I am not sure what caused the tipping point to talking about the potential of data sharing and open science to the exciting reality of it happening, but it seems to have come round (more or less). I do still harbour concerns that our own researchers will be left out of participation in the shared infrastructure that is the European Open Science Cloud because of Brexit-related barriers here.

Robin with attendeesOne talk that piqued my interest involved a survey of librarians in Gujarat about RDM and their capacity to deliver new types of service, by Dr. Bhakti Gala. As the Indian LIS (library and information science) curriculum was apparently seen to not be delivering RDM training to any great extent yet, the researcher had asked how the librarians had acquired knowledge of RDM. She said that about half the librarians who had pursued self-training had learned from the free, online MANTRA course (which stands for Research Data Management Training), offered by the University of Edinburgh.

The Chair of the panel, Prof Shalini Urs, with whom I had had a conversation over dinner with about the name of the course, said [naming me, as I sat in the audience] that I would be happy to hear that was the case, to which I of course smiled and nodded. Alluding to our prior conversation about whether the name was a cultural [mis-]appropriation or not, she looked me in the eye and said, “It is Our MANTRA, now.” Which is, of course, the great thing about Openness.