Welcome to the Odum Institute’s video on the
Virtual Archiving Demonstration Project.
Polling research data is a valuable resource; however, many challenges surround the
archiving and preservation of this data after it is
collected. The Virtual Archiving Project, funded by the
Institute for Museum and Library Services, helps
streamline the data curation process by providing a technical solution to help
research centers integrate archiving into the
data lifecycle. Under this project virtual archives within the
Odum Dataverse Network have been created for the University of South Carolina Institute for
Public Service and Policy Research, Monmouth
University Polling Institute, the Survey Research Center at the University of
Georgia, the Arkansas Poll at the University of
Arkansas, and the Center for Survey Research at Indiana
University.
So here you see these institution’s dataverses
within the Odum Dataverse Network. I’ll go into the Survey Research Center at
University of Georgia to show how UGA’s polling
data producers can easily archive new studies. So once within UGA’s Virtual Archive, a
producer can log-in, click on Options in the
upper right hand corner, and from this screen they can administer their
dataverse from managing collections to setting
access restrictions. So for instance, once a new polling study is
completed and needs to be archived, a producer can simply create a new study, then
agree to the Terms of Use. They can then fill-in the needed cataloging
information into the Georgia Poll template. Once this is completed the producer can easily
go back into the draft study and add files, edit
information or even destroy a study if necessary. I also want to point out that if I click the logo at
the top of the page I will be taken directly to
UGA’s Office of Research Services' website. Now that these dataverses are in place and the
data ingest process is simple and streamlined,
these institutions can easily archive and make available their research polling data to
the social science community through the
Dataverse Network virtual catalog. The Odum Institute Data Archive staff also
provides virtual archiving technical support to
these institutions to help ensure their data is discoverable and
archived in a timely manner. Additionally, these dataverses provide a portal to
the home institution helping connect users to
these institutions and giving these dataverses continuity with the
home institution’s website.
If you would like to create a dataverse for your
Polling Institution please contact Jonathan Crabtree at the Odum
Institute at odumarchive@unc.edu.
Thanks for watching!