The document discusses the challenges and opportunities in digital curation education, highlighting initiatives such as DigCCurr and the role of various institutions in developing curricula for digital preservation and management. It details the evolution and sustainability of training programs aimed at various audiences, emphasizing the importance of collaboration and adaptation to emerging digital practices. Key themes include the need for clear competency frameworks, diverse instructional methods, and mechanisms to ensure long-term educational impact in the field.

1. View from across the Pond:
Opportunities, Gaps, and Challenges in
Digital Curation Lifelong Learning
Helen R. Tibbo
School of Information & Library Science
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
DigCurV International Conference
Framing the Digital Curation Curriculum
May 6, 2013
1

2. Thank you!
* The Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) for
their generous support of numerous Digital Curation
Education initiatives in the US and especially for support
of the “DigCCurr II: Extending an International Digital
Curation Curriculum to Doctoral Students and
Practitioners” (#RE-05-08-0060-08).
* The DigCurV team for all their hard work on this project
and the solid framework they have developed.
* The European Commission that funded DigCurV through
their Leonardo da Vinci programme.
2

3. Sample Programs
3

4. Digital Preservation Management
Workshops: Some Observations
Slides from Nancy Y. McGovern,
Closing the Digital Curation Gap Symposium
4

5. DPM Workshops
First NEH grant awarded in 2002 (+ 2004, 2007, 2012)
First workshop presented in August 2003
More than 40 workshops in various formats
1400+ attendees, 350+ orgs (from 35+ countries, 6 continents)
Developed at Cornell, hosted by ICPSR, now at MIT
Workshop website: dpworkshop.org
Faculty evolves over time
Curriculum evolves: core concepts and framework
New grant: evaluate outcomes, recommend next steps5

6. (what?)
(how?) (how much?)
DPM Three-Legged Stool
holistic development of sustainable
programs

7. Five Stages of Program Development
1. Acknowledge: aware of digital preservation as a local
concern
2. Act: initiate digital preservation projects
3. Consolidate: segue from project to program
4. Institutionalize: rationalize program, aware of
community
5. Externalize: embrace inter-institutional collaboration,
dependency
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8. Curriculum
Desired outcomes
Common outcomes across cohorts
Encourage managers to build sustainable programs
Audience
Built for managers of digital content
Stress audience for each workshop
Extensions
Advanced topics
Models and examples
Contributions to other programs
US: DigCCurr, e-science Institute, DPOE, & SAA’s DAS
UK: DPTP, AIDA, CARDIO8

9. This is Nancy McGovern’s program
Hard to see this continuing without Nancy…
9
Is This Sustainable?

10. LOC Digital Preservation Outreach
& Education Program (DPOE)
10

11. Train the Trainer Mission
The LIBRARY of CONGRESS
To foster national outreach and education about
digital preservation by building a collaborative
network of instructors and partners to provide
training to individuals and organizations seeking to
preserve their digital content.
Train the Trainer Mission
11
Slides from George Coulbourne, Office of Strategic Initiatives, Library of Congress

12. Distribute Training through a
National Network
12

13. …for an Industry Ready Curriculum
Identify - what digital content do you have?
Select - what portion of that content will be preserved?
Store - what issues are there for long term storage?
Protect - what steps are needed to protect your digital
content?
Manage - what provisions are needed for long-term
management?
Provide - what considerations are there for long-term
access?
The LIBRARY of CONGRESS
13

14. Targeted at Each Layer of the Workforce
The LIBRARY of CONGRESS
14

15. Planned Locally and Promoted Nationally
15

16. Institutional home
Instructors not paid
So far, many instructors have been
eager to help out!
16
Is This Sustainable?

17. DigCCurr I & II
School of Information and Library Science
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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18. DigCCurr I
say: seeker
Preserving Access to Our Digital Future: Building an
International Digital Curation Curriculum.
http://www.ils.unc.edu/digccurr.
IMLS Grant # RE-05-06-0044
Collaboration of School of Information & Library Science
(SILS), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH)
& U.S. National Archives & Records Administration (NARA)
Ran July 1, 2006 – December 31, 2009
18

19. DigCCurr I Components
Curriculum:
To prepare students for digital curation with wide variety of organizations,
contexts & types of resources:
Graduate-level (master’s) curricular framework
Course modules
Course development
Experiential components
International guest speakers
Two International Symposia:
DigCCurr2007: April 18-20, 2007 in Chapel Hill -
http://ils.unc.edu/digccurr2007/
DigCCurr2009: Practice, Promise and Prospects: April 1-3, 2009 in
Chapel Hill - http://ils.unc.edu/digccurr2009
Carolina Digital Curation Fellowship program (master’s students)
19

20. DigCCurr Matrix of Digital Curation
Knowledge & Competencies
 Tool for thinking about, planning for, identifying &
organizing material to cover in curriculum.
 Each unit of curriculum content can address one or
more dimensions.
 Helping us to address a fundamental issue: All
digital curation students should all get some
aspects of the curriculum, but other aspects will
only be necessary for students planning to work in
particular types of places or jobs (i.e. balancing
core vs. specialized knowledge).
20

21. Six Matrix Dimensions
Mandates, values & principles.
Professional, disciplinary or institutional/organizational
context.
Transition point in information continuum/lifecycle.
Type of resource.
Function or skill.
Prerequisite knowledge.
http://ils.unc.edu/digccurr/digccurr-matrix.html
21

22. DigCCurr II
“Extending an International Digital Curation
Curriculum to Doctoral Students and Practitioners.”
http://www.ils.unc.edu/digccurr.
This project is funded through IMLS Laura Bush funds.
A collaboration of the School of Information and
Library Science (SILS) at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) and the U.S. National
Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and
Univ. of Toronto through Seamus Ross.
Project to run August 1, 2008 – July 31, 2013.
22

23. DigCCurr II Key Activities
PhD Fellowships - 6
Digital Curation Exchange (DCE)
http://digitalcurationexchange.org/
Summer Institutes
Week-long summer workshop for practitioners.
Follow-up session held approximately six months
later. http://www.ils.unc.edu/digccurr/institute.html
Fifth to be held May 12-17, 2013
Public Symposia - Third held January 9, 2013
CurateGear
Ph.D. Seminar Series, 2012-2013
AERI Workshop, July 2012
“Curate Thyself,” March 17, 2013
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24. http://digitalcurationexchange.org/
24

25. SILS Digital Curation Programs
Master’s of Science in Library or Information
Science.
Concentration in Archives and Records Management.
Certificate in Digital Curation.
Dual MSIS/MSLS – MPA program with UNC School of
Government.
10+ Ph.D. students in digital curation presently.
DigCCurr Professional Institute and other life-long
professional education & support.
25

26. Drs. Helen Tibbo & Christopher Lee are the driving
forces behind the DigCCurr Professional Institute
We are not being paid for conducting the Institute…
How long will be do it???
DigCCurr hopefully will live on in the Matrix and those
it has educated
The SILS Certificate (30 credit degree) in Data
Curation is expensive…
26
Is This Sustainable?

27. SAA’s Digital Archives Specialist
(DAS) Curriculum &
Certificate
27

28. DAS
Was conceptualized in 2011 while I was SAA President
Is developed and refreshed by experts in the field of
digital archives
Is structured in tiers of study
Is offered face-to-face around the country or via
webinars
28

29. DAS Designed to:
Provide education and training to ensure that
archivists adopt appropriate practices for appraising,
capturing, preserving, and providing access to
electronic records.
Provide archivists with the information and tools they
need to manage the demands of born-digital records.
29

30. Four Tiers of Study
Foundational Courses focus on the essential skills that archivists
need to manage digital archives. They focus primarily, but not
exclusively, on the needs of practitioners—archivists who are or will
be working directly with electronic records. These courses present
information that an archivist might implement in the next year.
Tactical and Strategic Courses focus on the skills that archivists
need to make significant changes in their organizations so that they
can develop a digital archives and work seriously on managing
electronic records. They focus primarily, but not exclusively, on the
needs of managers—those archivists who manage other
professionals and who oversee programmatic operations. These
courses present information that an archivist might implement in
the next five years.
30

31. Four tiers of study
Tools and Services Courses focus on specific tools and services that
archivists need to use for their work with digital archives. They are
practical courses focused on specific software products and other
tools and they focus primarily, but not exclusively, on the needs of
practitioner archivists. These courses present information that an
archivist could implement immediately.
Transformational Courses focus on the skills that archivists need to
change their working lives dramatically and transform their
institutions into full-fledged digital archives. They focus primarily,
but not exclusively, on the needs of administrators—those
archivists with oversight over the entire archival enterprise of an
institution. These courses present information that an archivist
might implement over the course of the next ten years.
31

32. Key audiences
The Archivist Practitioner is a hands-on, front-line archivist
who manages or will manage electronic records personally.
The Archivist Manager is an archivist who has oversight
over the work of other professional archivists and who
may or may not manage electronic records directly.
The Archivist Administrator is an archivist who works in a
large archives, who oversees archivist managers, who is
responsible for organizational planning, and who does not
manage electronic records directly but must ensure the
organization’s capacity to do so.
32

33. 7 digital competencies
#1: Understand the nature of records in electronic form,
including the functions of various storage media, the
nature of system dependence, and the effect on integrity
of records over time.
#2: Communicate and define requirements, roles, and
responsibilities related to digital archives to a variety of
partners and audiences.
#3: Formulate strategies and tactics for appraising,
describing, managing, organizing, and preserving digital
archives.
33

34. 7 digital competencies
#4: Integrate technologies, tools, software, and media
within existing functions for appraising, capturing,
preserving, and providing access to digital collections.
#5: Plan for the integration of new tools or successive
generations of emerging technologies, software, and
media.
#6: Curate, store, and retrieve original masters and access
copies of digital archives.
#7: Provide dependable organization and service to
designated communities across networks.
34

35. Run by a professional society, not individuals
Not dependent on grant funding
SAA has made this a revenue stream upon which they
depend
Wide range and supply of instructors (who do get paid,
albeit a small amount)
A community effort – archivists training other archivists
DAS appears to have the greatest chance of sustainability
of the continuing education programs presented here
35
Is This Sustainable?

36. Challenges for Professional
Education in Digital Curation
36

37. How long/extensive should training be?
Where should training be held?
How should training be supported/funded?
How much should training cost?
“Everything should be 5 cents!”
What types of credentialing are appropriate?
Who should do the instruction?
Should instruction be broad or specific?
What should be the content?
What prerequisite knowledge is necessary?
Open Questions for Professional
Education in Digital Curation
37

38. Patchwork quilt of course offerings
Format of offerings
Face-to-face
Webinar
Length of offerings
1-2 hours
½ day
1 day
2-3 days
1 week
1 week +
Multi –workshops over time
5 course certificates
10 course certificate
Current Professional Education
Landscape in Digital Curation
38

39. College/university – participants come to teachers
Have workshop will travel
One’s computer (webinar)
A series in one place
A series in multiple places
Venues for Professional Education in
Digital Curation
39

40. Grant-funded projects
Income stream for professional
organizations
Continuing education programs in
universities
Commercial firms
Conducting and charging for
programs
PASIG – Oracle
Sources for Professional Education in
Digital Curation
40

41. Integrated programs that address technical and
professional knowledge and skills across the digital
asset lifecycle.
Capacity to specialize in various functions,
environments, and material types.
Programs that address specific digital environments &
resource types.
Gaps to Fill
41

42. Pedagogical Issues
42

43. What to Teach?
Curriculum just being developed and following a
blend of archival, information, business, and ethical
principles along with cutting edge technical and
process developments.
Core content unclear; range of content is unclear.
What is core vs. extended/specialized content?
Uncertainty at all educational levels.
43

44. How to Teach?
Face-to-face vs. remote.
Lecture/discussion vs. hands-on, what’s the right mixture?
What is the role of field experiences/internships/residency
programs?
How do we sustain internships when grant money runs out?
44

45. Audience Level
* At what audience(s) should digital curation education be
aimed?
* How do we articulate the range of audiences?
* What are the implications for pre-requisite knowledge?
* What can we expect various audiences to know in
advance?
* What can we teach based on what an audience knows?
* How do we best deal with mixed-level audiences?
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46. Audience Focus
How do teaching methods and content change based
on the focus of the audience?
Do we provide different content/methods for scientists
who need to manage data vs. humanists vs. the general
public?
How do we best teach data curation and information
management to content specialists (individual curators)
vs. professional curators?
How do we best segment the marketplace?
46

47. Programmatic Duration
How long?
How do pedagogical goals relate to length of
instruction?
What can we teach in 2 hours? 2 days? 2 weeks? 2
months? 2 years?
How do you get a core of information management
and curation to specialized audiences who have a
limited attention span for learning about digital
curation?
47

48. Programmatic Sustainability
• Who is going to pay for all this?
• What is the business model for continuing education?
• Who is going to take this on?
• How is the academy going to be rewarded for working in
this arena beyond formal graduate and undergraduate
education?
• How can we reach such a large audience (everyone needs to
know about digital curation!)?
• Can I-Schools provide the digital curation teaching capacity
that the government, military, corporate, scientific,
academic, and public sectors will require?
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49. Where Are We?
Everything above is exploratory and experimental –
even the formal looking concentrations and
certificates.
There is only an emerging canon for the field of digital
curation.
Research and development is rapid but not easily
translated into workflows of existing professionals.
We are working this out.
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50. Educational Needs
Digital curation educators need to work together,
across national boundaries and across levels, scope,
and instructional purpose.
We need to share materials and discuss approaches
and emerging good practice.
We need to ramp-up the educational workforce.
We need to ramp-up educational efforts.
50

51. Next Steps
Analogous to needs in digital curation as a whole, we
need to:
Move from hand-crafted approaches to wide-spread and
easily replicable solutions.
Produce more educators who can train the trainer?
Be able to certify learning.
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52. 52
THANK YOU
Questions?
Please visit the Digital Curation Exchange
at digitalcurationexchange.org
Feedback…
tibbo@email.unc.edu

53. ASIST 2008, Columbus, OH 53
DigCCurr Professional Institute:
Curation Practices for the Digital Object Lifecycle
May 12-17, 2013 & January 6-7, 2014
Chapel Hill, NC, USA
http://www.ils.unc.edu/digccurr/institute.html53