- ETDs (Electronic Theses and Dissertations) have grown enormously in recent years, with over 6 million items now available in open access repositories worldwide. - Factors like knowledge organization systems (KOS) and discovery services have helped improve management and retrieval of ETDs, but issues around policies, metadata standards, and open access remain. - Making ETDs openly accessible online can help research and development by increasing global awareness of universities' work, but many institutions still embargo access or do not make ETDs open at all. - To address ongoing challenges, experts recommend developing uniform global policies modeled after the NDLTD, encouraging open access of scholarly works through institutional repositories, and providing training