Author Archives: Isabel Chadwick

About Isabel Chadwick

Research Support Librarian at the Open University. I look after ORDO, the institutional research data repository and provide guidance and training on all thing research data related.

UK Data Service Introductory Training Series 2021

The UK Data Service specialises in the management and archiving of research data in the social sciences. They are running a comprehensive series of free online training over the coming months which may be of interest to readers of this blog.

See below for these events in Spring 2021 and see the UK Data Service’s events pages for a full list of training events.

The workshops in the series will have a new practical element.

To book a place visit the UK Data Service events page or click on the links above.

Recordings of UK Data Service webinars can be found on the UKDS YouTube channel and slides can be found on the past events pages.

Open Access Week 2020: Responsible Metrics, DORA, Open Access and Academic Career Advancement

We’re delighted to announce another event for Open Access Week!

Join Dr Muriel Swijghuisen Reigersberg, Research Impact and Knowledge Exchange Senior Manager, RES for an online seminar: “Responsible Metrics, DORA, Open Access and Academic Career Development” on Thursday, 22nd October 2020, 13:00 – 14:00

In 2019 the OU Research Board agreed that the OU would become a signatory to DORA (Declaration on Research Assessment) and is set to sign up no later than January 2021.

DORA stipulates that career advancement, recruitment, retention and development opportunities must not use Journal Impact Factors as a means of allocating such opportunities. Alongside public reports such as The Metric Tide and other initiatives such as the Leiden Manifesto, DORA signals a move within the sector to make processes of research assessment more equitable to ensure the Higher Education sector remains inclusive and diverse.

This presentation will take a closer look at DORA, its implications alongside other initiatives and explain why it matters to not just individual and institutional research aims and goals but ultimately also impacts on the creation of new knowledge about the world we live in.

Anyone affected by research assessment exercises, who supports academic career development or wishes to develop a career in research themselves is encouraged to attend, including students and professional staff. DORA has specific implications for STEM researchers, but with the increase in open access and digital scholarship in the arts, humanities and social sciences researchers from those fields may wish to attend as well.

Book via Eventbrite

COVID-19 Data Dive: Exploring the social and economic impacts of the pandemic

The UK Data Service is running the following event which may be of interest to some readers of this blog.


COVID-19 Data Dive: Exploring the social and economic impacts of the pandemic

22 – 23 October 2020

Online

The longer term social and economic impacts of COVID-19 are yet to be evidenced but there are already signs of shorter term challenges.

The UK Data Service has organised a free, two-day Data Dive as part of the rapid research response to the pandemic. By bringing together major social, economic and population studies in a single place, we provide an opportunity for researchers, policy and charity experts to collaborate and draw out critical questions about the impacts of the pandemic that will need to be addressed in the future.

The event is jointly organised by the UK Data Service, Understanding Society, UCL Centre for Longitudinal Studies (CLS) and the Welfare at a (Social) Distance research project; all UK Research Innovation programmes.

Programme

Participants will work in small teams alongside different experts from other organisations, including data producers, policymakers and charities, and will be able to link with other related datasets, to find new areas of research interest.

The challenge: What do we know and what do we still need to ask about COVID-19 and its social and economic impacts on society?

How can we utilise the data resources to learn and discover themes and ideas for next steps.

During the Data Dive, participants will:

  • learn about the UK Data Service collection of COVID-19 data
  • utilise and explore the major COVID-19 studies
  • gain insights from the data providers and policy experts
  • gain practical experience of manipulating data
  • examine themes and explore new research questions
  • present findings as a team
  • examine outcomes and future research opportunities

We’d like to hear from you: Please submit details via the expression of interest form.

Successful applicants will be sent a registration link to book. Once registered, you will receive an email with joining instructions and the Zoom link to attend the event.

  1. Which topic(s) would you like to examine with the data? Please provide 2-3 sentences about your area of interest.
  1. Which categories best represent your skills?
  • data wrangler: you understand how to manage and interpret the data to create graphs and data visualisations
  • ideas person: you ask pertinent questions and formulate ideas for next steps
  • coder: you are comfortable coding in various languages such as Python and R
  • data expert: you understand how to manage data and run and interpret statistical analysis, using R, Python, Stata, or other common data analysis tools
  • policy expert: you are an expert in social and/or economic policy and use the data to bring expert voices into the policymaking process
  • voluntary sector: you have an invested knowledge base of the subject matter

 More information

 Talk to the experts: During the day there will be a chance to talk to the experts from each of these major studies.

 Target audience: This Data Dive is aimed at researchers, data analysts, policymakers, charities, coders and Service users with special interest in the benefit system, social care, housing policy and the charity sector. Those not working directly with data are welcome; data specialists from the UK Data Service, Understanding Society, UCL Centre for Longitudinal Studies and University of Kent will be on hand to discuss the data.

 Experience/knowledge required: Participants should have basic experience of quantitative analysis using a statistics package OR have an invested knowledge base of the subject matter. If you are not yet UK Data Service users, participants will need to register with the UK Data Service before the start of the event to access the data. This is in addition to registering for the event.

Online location: The Data Dive will take place over Zoom.

For any enquiries please email comms@ukdataservice.ac.uk.

Follow the event on Twitter: #UKDSCovidDataDive

Adding your ORCiD to ORDO

Did you know that as well as linking ORO to ORCiD you can also link your ORCiD with your ORDO profile? This will add all your datasets in ORDO (and anywhere else that uses a DataCite DOI) to ORCiD.

This is really quick and easy to do, simply follow these steps:

  • In your profile page in ORDO (pictured), click the CONNECT button to enable syncing with your ORCiD
  • This will take you to ORCiD. Log in and click to authorise ORDO/Figshare to access your ORCiD account

You now need to authorise DataCite on your ORCiD account:

  • Log in to ORCiD
  • Go to your ORCiD Record tab
  • Scroll down to works at the bottom of the page
  • Hover on the +Add Works tab
  • This will open a dropdown menu
  • Click on the first item on the menu, Search and Link
  •  This will open a panel called Link Works. Find DataCite in the list.
  • Click on DataCite and on the following page click to authorise

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To check the authorisation has worked successfully head back to ORCiD and to your Account Settings tab. DataCite should now be listed as a Trusted organisation.

If you’re having problems setting this up or would like more information about using ORDO or ORCiD, please get in touch.

New training programme!

Here in the Library Research Support team we’ve been busy planning our training sessions for the next few months and we’re sure there’s going to be something that tickles your fancy!

We’ve got some new sessions planned, including an inroduction to copyright for Postgraduate Research Students and some more in depth sessions on Research Data Management, including the intriguingly named Declutter your Data!

All of our training for the remainder of 2020 will be delivered online through our Adobe Connect room so you can access all these sessions wherever you are in the world! Details of how to access the room are included on the My Learning Centre pages linked to below.

Library Research Support training September-December 2020

Managing your data during a pandemic

We’re all embracing our new co-workers

The world as we know it has changed, and it seems unlikely that we will be returning to what we previously considered “normal” for some time.

While you’re working from home during this period you might feel as though conducting your research is harder, or even impossible. However, you now plenty of time to get on top of managing your research data! Here are some top tips from the Library Research Support Team: