Amelia Acker
National Science Foundation (NSF)
10/01/2020 to 01/31/2024
$461,085 was awarded over the project period. Of the total funding, $303,031 was awarded to UT Austin iSchool.
Collaborative Research: Data Afterlives: The long-term impact of NSF Data Management Plans on data archiving and sharing for increased access
In 2011, the National Science Foundation began requiring that all funded projects provide data management plans (DMPs) to ensure that project data, computer codes, and methodological procedures were available to other scientists for future use. However, the extent to which these data management requirements have resulted in more and better use of project data remains an open question. This project thus investigates the National Science Foundation's DMP mandate as a national science policy and examines the broad impacts of this policy across a strategic sample of five disciplines funded by the National Science Foundation. It considers the organization and structure of DMPs across fields, the institutions involved in data sharing, data preservation practices, the extent to which DMPs enable others to use secondary project data, and the kinds of data governance and preservation practices that ensure that data are sustained and accessible. Systematic investigation of the impact of DMPs and data sharing cultures across fields will assist funding agencies and research scientists working to produce reproducible and open science by identifying barriers to data archiving, sharing, and access. The principal investigators will use project findings to develop data governance guidelines for information professionals working with scientific data and to articulate best practices for scientific communities using DMPs for data management.
This project aims to enhance understanding of the role data management plans (DMPs) play in shaping data life-cycles. It does so by examining DMPs across five fields funded by the National Science Foundation to understand data practices, archiving and access issues, the infrastructures that support data sharing and reuse, and the extent to which project data are later used by other researchers. In phase I, the investigators will gather a strategic sample of DMPs representing a wide range of data types and data retention practices from different scientific fields. Phase II consists of forensic data analysis of a subset of DMPs to discover what has become of project data. Phase III develops detailed case studies of research project data life-cycles and data afterlives with qualitative interviews and archival documentary analysis to help develop best practices for sustainable data preservation, access, and sharing. Phase IV will translate findings into data governance recommendations for stakeholders. The project thus contributes to research about contemporary studies of scientific data production and circulation while assessing the effect of DMPs as a national science policy initiative affecting data management practices in different scientific communities. The comparative research design and mixed methods enables theory building about cross-disciplinary data practices and data cultures across fields and advances knowledge within data studies, information management studies, and science and technology studies.
Kayla Booth
Jose Sanchez, Queens College, City University of New York;
Lynnette Yarger, The Pennsylvania State University;
Elizabeth Eikey, University of California San Diego
Institute of Museum and Library Science (IMLS)
04/01/2023 to 03/31/2024
The collaborative award is $246,588 over the project period. The School of Information portion of the award is $150,180.
Built-In Belonging: Scaling and Fostering Diverse and Inclusive Intergenerational Communities of Practice
The team has completed focus groups with iSchool Inclusion Institute participants where we piloted interview questions, tested and adjusted the questions, and gathered preliminary information on how community and belonging are cultivated. During the pandemic, we pivoted to longitudinal surveys where we used the theoretical framework and findings from the focus groups to investigate sense of belonging and community over time not only with LIS recruitment programs, but also compared to experiences in other institutions. We aim to now expand on the data collected primarily to complete interviews and disseminate findings. Interviews will provide nuanced data on how underrepresented students develop community within LIS recruitment programs, how this sense of community changes over time, which programmatic elements play a role in this evolution, how sense of community compares to experiences in other institutions, and how feelings in recruitment can scale to address isolation and gaps in support.
Kayla Booth
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
11/01/2021 to 10/31/2024
The award is $700,772 over the project period.
Summer Institutes for Advanced Study in the Information Sciences
The iSchool Inclusion Institute (i3) is an undergraduate research and leadership development program that prepares students from underrepresented populations for graduate study and careers in the information sciences. Only 25 students from across the country are selected each year to become i3 Scholars. Those students undertake a yearlong experience that includes two summer institutes hosted by the University of Texas at Austin’s iSchool and a research project spanning the year. i3 prepares students for the rigors of graduate study and serves as a pipeline for i3 Scholars into internationally recognized information schools—the iSchools. Most importantly, i3 empowers students to create change and make an impact on the people around them.
Amelia Acker
Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS)
06/01/2018 to 01/31/2024
The collaborative award is $199,811 over the project period. The School of Information portion of the award is $38,932.
Investigating Platform Development for Mobile and Social Media Data Preservation
The information we generate on social media sites and in mobile device apps represents the fastest form of data creation and collection in the United States. However, these data traces are complicated to work with because they are varied, inter-dependent, and vulnerable to loss. In this Early Career Development project, Dr. Amelia Acker at the University of Texas at Austin, will conduct a three-year, qualitative investigation into the activities of engineers and designers at five institutions where social media software is being developed. This project to better understand developer cultures will aid archives, libraries, and museums as they develop and implement best practices for gathering and preserving social media collections.