Announcing Five Joining DCN Members and the Growth of the RADS Initiative

This post was authored by Jennifer Moore, Head of Data Services at WashU, and Mikala Narlock, DCN Director.

The Data Curation Network (DCN) is excited to announce the addition of five new members, who will be joining our community from August 19, 2024, to August 14, 2026.

Joining members:

University of Arizona 

Institutional Representative: Fernando Rios, Associate Specialist, Research Data Management

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

Institutional Representative: Hejin Shin, Data Services Librarian

University of Kentucky

Institutional Representative: Isaac Wink, Research Data Librarian

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Institutional Representative: Amanda Koziura, Head, Scholarly Communication and Data Services

University of South Carolina

Institutional Representative: Stacy Winchester, Research Data Librarian

These institutional memberships are among the incentives for participating in the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) funded (LG-254930-OLS-23) Realities of Academic Data Sharing (RADS) Initiative, a research project led by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), that focuses on understanding the complexities and costs associated with sharing data from funded research.

They join DCN members and RADS institutions, Duke University, University at Buffalo, University of Minnesota, and Washington University in St. Louis. Owing to their outstanding application to the  RADS project, two DCN member institutions will also join RADS. The RADS team will leverage their knowledge and experience in data sharing to infuse our research, as we examine data sharing costs at our respective institutions. The DCN members joining the RADS project are:

New York University

Research Lead: Nicholas Wolf, Co-Head, Data Services and Research Data Management Librarian

University of Nebraska–Lincoln

Research Lead: Leslie Delserone, Professor/Research Data Services & Science Librarian

The DCN looks forward to the joining institutions’ diverse perspectives and expertise, representing various research and development environments, institutional repository models, and levels of local curation support. 

With the addition of the joining members, DCN membership will increase by a staggering 25%. Although DCN has approached growth slowly and intentionally over the years, this influx of institutions will bring fresh eyes, present different challenges, and new opportunities which we anticipate will enrich our community. DCN is excited to collaborate with the RADS cohort over the next two years! 

Being a part of the DCN will enhance access to our community of practice, workflow collaboration and sharing, training, and  potentially expand their data curation capacity. DCN membership can elevate an institution’s curation service by expanding the range of disciplines that can be curated, providing a deep knowledge base, and by providing a framework from which institutions can formalize local practices and workflows.
The full roster of DCN curators from our new members will be released shortly and added to the gallery of current curators. For additional information, see the ARL news release.