Category Archives: Collaborations

Announcements, Behind the Scenes, Collaborations, Collections, Digital Collections, New Collections, Projects

Good News from the DPC: Digitization of Behind the Veil Tapes is Underway

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This post was written by Jen Jordan, a graduate student at Simmons University studying Library Science with a concentration in Archives Management. She is the Digital Collections intern with the Digital Collections and Curation Services Department.  Jen will complete her masters degree in December 2021. 

The Digital Production Center (DPC) is thrilled to announce that work is underway on a 3-year long National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant-funded project to digitize the entirety of Behind the Veil: Documenting African-American Life in the Jim Crow South, an oral history project that produced 1,260 interviews spanning more than 1,800 audio cassette tapes. Accompanying the 2,000 plus hours of audio is a sizable collection of visual materials (e.g.- photographic prints and slides) that form a connection with the recorded voices.

We are here to summarize the logistical details relating to the digitization of this incredible collection. To learn more about its historical significance and the grant that is funding this project, titled “Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South: Digital Access to the Behind the Veil Project Archive,” please take some time to read the July announcement written by John Gartrell, Director of the John Hope Franklin Research Center and Principal Investigator for this project. Co-Principal Investigator of this grant is Giao Luong Baker, Digital Production Services Manager.

Digitizing Behind the Veil (BTV) will require, in part, the services of outside vendors to handle the audio digitization and subsequent captioning of the recordings. While the DPC regularly digitizes audio recordings, we are not equipped to do so at this scale (while balancing other existing priorities). The folks at Rubenstein Library have already been hard at work double checking the inventory to ensure that each cassette tape and case are labeled with identifiers. The DPC then received the tapes, filling 48 archival boxes, along with a digitization guide (i.e. – an Excel spreadsheet) containing detailed metadata for each tape in the collection. Upon receiving the tapes, DPC staff set to boxing them for shipment to the vendor. As of this writing, the boxes are snugly wrapped on a pallet in Perkins Shipping & Receiving, where they will soon begin their journey to a digital format.

The wait has begun! In eight to twelve weeks we anticipate receiving the digital files, at which point we will perform quality control (QC) on each one before sending them off for captioning. As the captions are returned, we will run through a second round of QC. From there, the files will be ingested into the Duke Digital Repository, at which point our job is complete. Of course, we still have the visual materials to contend with, but we’ll save that for another blog! 

As we creep closer to the two-year mark of the COVID-19 pandemic and the varying degrees of restrictions that have come with it, the DPC will continue to focus on fulfilling patron reproduction requests, which have comprised the bulk of our work for some time now. We are proud to support researchers by facilitating digital access to materials, and we are equally excited to have begun work on a project of the scale and cultural impact that is Behind the Veil. When finished, this collection will be accessible for all to learn from and meditate on—and that’s what it’s all about. 

 

Collaborations, Profiles

Data Sharing and Equity: Sabrina McCutchan, Data Architect

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This post is part of the Research Data Curation Team’s ‘Researcher Highlight’ series.

Equity in Collaboration

The landscape of research and data is enterprising, expansive and diverse. This dynamic is notably visible in the work done at Duke Global Health Institute (DGHI). Collaboration with international partners inherently comes with many challenges. In a conversation with the Duke Research Data Curation team, Sabrina McCutchan of the Research Design and Analysis Core (RDAC) at DGHI shares her thoughts on why data sharing and access is critical to global health research.

Questions of equity must be addressed when discussing research data and scholarship on a global scale. For the DGHI data equity is a priority. International research partners deserve equal access to primary data to better understand what’s happening in their communities, contribute to policy initiatives that support their populations, and support their own professional advancement by publishing in research and medical journals.

 “We work with so many different countries, people groups, and populations around the world that often themselves don’t have access to the same infrastructure, technologies or training in data. It can be challenging to collect quality primary data on their own, but  becomes a little easier in partnership with a big research institution like Duke.”

Collaborations like the Adolescent Mental Health in Africa Network Initiative (AMANI) demonstrate the significance of data sharing. AMANI is led by Dr. Dorothy Dow of DGHI, Dr. Lukoye Atwoli of Moi University School of Medicine, and Dr. Sylvia Kaaya of Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS) and involves participating researchers from academic and medical institutions in South Africa, Kenya, and Tanzania.

Why Share Data?

As a Data Architect, Sabrina is available to support DGHI in achieving their data sharing goals. She takes a holistic approach to identifying areas where the team needs data support. Considering at each stage of the project lifecycle how system design and data architecture will influence how data can be shared. This may entail drafting informed consent documents, developing strategies for de-identification, curating and managing data, or discovering solutions for data storage and publishing. For instance, in collaboration with CDVS Research Data Management Consultants, Sabrina has helped AMANI create a Dataverse to enable sharing restricted access health data for international junior researchers. Data from one of DGHI’s studies are also available in the Duke Research Data Repository.

“All of these components are interconnected to each other. You really need to think about what are going to be the impacts of a decision made early in the process of gathering data for this study further downstream when we’re analyzing that data and publishing findings from it.”

Reproducibility is another reason that sharing and publishing data is important to Sabrina. DGHI wants to increase data availability in accordance with FAIR principles so other researchers can independently verify, reproduce, and iterate on their work. This supports peers and contributes to the advancement of the field. Publishing data in an open repository can also increase their reach and impact. DGHI is also currently examining how to incorporate the CARE principles and other frameworks for ethical data sharing within their international collaborations.

Global collaborations in research are vital in these times. Sabrina advises that it’s important for researchers, especially Principal Investigators, to think holistically about research projects. For example, thinking about data sharing at the very beginning of the project and writing consent forms that support what they hope to do with the data. Equitable practices paired with data sharing create opportunities for greater discovery and progress in research.

 

Announcements, Behind the Scenes, Collaborations, Collections, Digital Collections, New Collections, Uncategorized

Access for One, Access for All: DPC’s Approach towards Folder Level Digitization

Earlier this year and prior to the pandemic, Digital Production Center (DPC) staff piloted an alternative approach to digitize patron requests with the Rubenstein Library’s Research Services (RLRS) team. The previous approach was focused on digitizing specific items that instruction librarians and patrons requested, and these items were delivered directly to that person. The alternative strategy, the Folder Level digitization approach, involves digitizing the contents of the entire folder that the item is contained in, ingesting these materials to the Duke Digital Repository (to enable Duke Library staff to retrieve these items), and when possible, publishing these materials so that they are available to anyone with internet access. This soft launch prepared us for what is now an all-hands-on-deck-but-in-a-socially-distant-manner digitization workflow.

Giao Luong Baker assessing folders in the DPC.

Since returning to campus for onsite digitization in late June, the DPC’s primary focus has been to perfect and ramp up this new workflow. It is important to note that the term “folder” in this case is more of a concept and that its contents and their conditions vary widely. Some folders may have 2 pages, other folders have over 300 pages. Some folders consists of pamphlets, notebooks, maps, papyri, and bound items. All this to say that a “folder” is a relatively loose term.

Like many initiatives at Duke Libraries, Folder Level Digitization is not just a DPC operation, it is a collaborative effort. This effort includes RLRS working with instructors and patrons to identify and retrieve the materials. RLRS also works with Rubenstein Library Technical Services (RLTS) to create starter digitization guides, which are the building blocks for our digitization guide. Lastly, RLRS vets the materials and determines their level of access. When necessary, Duke Library’s Conservation team steps in to prepare materials for digitization. After the materials are digitized, ingest and metadata work by the Digital Collections and Curation Services as well as the RLTS teams ensure that the materials are preserved and available in our systems.

Kristin Phelps captures a color target.

Doing this work in the midst of a pandemic requires that DPC work closely with the Rubenstein Library Access Services Reproduction Team (a section of RLRS) to track our workflow using a Google Doc. We track the point where the materials are identified by RLRS, through multiple quarantine periods, scanning, post processing, file delivery, to ingest. Also, DPC staff are digitizing in a manner that is consistent with COVID-19 guidelines. Materials are quarantined before and after they arrive at the DPC, machines and workspaces are cleaned before and after use, capture is done in separate rooms, and quality control is done off site with specialized calibrated monitors.

Since we started Folder Level digitization, the DPC has received close to 200 unique Instruction and Patron requests from RLRS. As of the publication of this post, 207 individual folders (an individual request may contain several folders) have been digitized. In total, we’ve scanned and quality controlled over 26,000 images since we returned to campus!

By digitizing entire folders, we hope this will allow for increased access to the materials without risking damage through their physical handling. So far we anticipate that 80 new digital collections will be ingested to the Duke Digital Repository. This number will only grow as we receive more requests. Folder Level Digitization is an exciting approach towards digital collection development, as it is directly responsive to instruction and researcher needs. With this approach, it is access for one, access for all!

Announcements, Behind the Scenes, Collaborations, MSI, Profiles

Congratulations and farewell to Mike Adamo

This week, Digitization Specialist Mike Adamo will move on from Duke Libraries after 14 years to assume a new position as Digital Imaging Coordinator at the Libraries of Virginia Tech University. Mike has contributed so much to our Digital Collections program during his tenure, providing years of uncompromising still imaging services, stewardship in times of change for the Digital Production Center, as well as leadership of and then years of service on our Digital Collections Implementation Team. He has also been the lead digitization specialist on some of our most well known digital collections like the Hugh Mangum photographs, James Karales photographs and William Gedney collection.

In addition, Mike has been a principal figure on our Multispectral Imaging Team and has been invaluable to our development of this service for the library. He established the setup and led all MSI imaging sessions; collaborated cross-departmentally with other members on the MSI Team to vet requests and develop workflows; and worked with vendors and other MSI practitioners to develop best practices, documentation, and a preservation plan and service model for MSI services at Duke Libraries. He’s also provided maintenance for our MSI equipment, researching options for additional equipment as our program grew.

Side by side comparison of a papyri item under natural light and the same item after multispectral imaging and processing.

We are grateful to Mike for his years of dedication to the job at to the field of cultural heritage digitization as well as for the instrumental role he’s played in developing MSI Services at DUL. We offer a huge thank you to Mike for his work and wish him well in his future position!

Post contributed by Giao Luong Baker and Erin Hammeke

Behind the Scenes, Collaborations, Duke Digital Repository

It Takes a Village to Curate Your Data: Duke Partners with the Data Curation Network

In early 2017, Duke University Libraries launched a research data curation program designed to help researchers on campus ensure that their data are adequately prepared for both sharing and publication, and long term preservation and re-use. Why the focus on research data? Data generated by scholars in the course of their investigation are increasingly being recognized as outputs similar in importance to the scholarly publications they support. Open data sharing reinforces unfettered intellectual inquiry, fosters transparency, reproducibility and broader analysis, and permits the creation of new data sets when data from multiple sources are combined. For these reasons, a growing number of publishers and funding agencies like PLoS ONE and the National Science Foundation are requiring researchers to make openly available the data underlying the results of their research.

Data curation steps

But data sharing can only be successful if the data have been properly documented and described. And they are only useful in the long term if steps have been taken to mitigate the risks of file format obsolescence and bit rot. To address these concerns, Duke’s data curation workflow will review a researcher’s data for appropriate documentation (such as README files or codebooks), solicit and refine Dublin Core metadata about the dataset, and make sure files are named and arranged in a way that facilitates secondary use. Additionally, the curation team can make suggestions about preferred file formats for long-term re-use and conduct a brief review for personally identifiable information. Once the data package has been reviewed, the curation team can then help researchers make their data available in Duke’s own Research Data Repository, where the data can be licensed and assigned a Digital Object Identifier, ensuring persistent access.

 

“The Data Curation Network (DCN) serves as the “human layer” in the data repository stack and seamlessly connects local data sets to expert data curators via a cross-institutional shared staffing model.”

 

New to Duke’s curation workflow is the ability to rely on the domain expertise of our colleagues at a few other research institutions. While our data curators here at Duke possess a wealth of knowledge about general research data-related best practices, and are especially well-versed in the vagaries of social sciences data, they may not always have the all the information they need to sufficiently assess the state of a dataset from a researcher. As an answer to this problem, the Data Curation Network, an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation-funded endeavor, has established a cross-institutional staffing model that distributes the domain expertise of each of its partner institutions. Should a curator at one institution encounter data of a kind with which they are unfamiliar, submission to the DCN opens up the possibility for enhanced curation from a network partner with the requisite knowledge.

DCN Partner Institutions
DCN Partner Institutions

Duke joins Cornell University, Dryad Digital Repository, Johns Hopkins University, University of Illinois, University of Michigan, University of Minnesota, and Pennsylvania State University in partnering to provide curatorial expertise to the DCN. As of January of this year, the project has moved out of pilot phase into production, and is actively moving data through the network. If a Duke researcher were to submit a dataset our curation team thought would benefit from further examination by a curator with domain knowledge, we will now reach out to the potential depositor to receive clearance to submit the data to the network. We’re very excited about this opportunity to provide this enhancement to our service!

Looking forward, the DCN hopes to expand their offerings to include nation-wide training on specialized data curation and to extend the curation services the network offers beyond the partner institutions to individual end users. Duke looks forward to contributing as the project grows and evolves.