Digital Data Management, Curation, and Archiving

Below are federal agency and other funder guidelines for data management planning and sharing. In contrast to Public Access Plans, within which requirements and additional details may be pending, the policies below are currently in effect.

Agencies and sponsors are listed in alphabetical order.

The description of research methods for proposals submitted to the Sloan Foundation must address multiple aspects of research data management and sharing, including:

• How will data and code be shared, annotated, cited, and archived?
• Plans or strategies to make findings reproducible by other researchers.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have annouced an Open Access policy that is in effect for all new agreements beginning January 1, 2015. Notably, after a two year transition period, publisher embargoes will not be allowed after January 1, 2017. Other aspects of the policy include:

• Online discovery and access for all publications.
• Mandated use of a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Generic License (CC BY 4.0).
• Immediate publication of data underlying published research results.

Details are available from the Foundation's website: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Open Access Policy

Per the DoD Public Access plan: Data underlying the conclusions of peer-reviewed journal publications will be made freely available at the time of the initial publication.

Note however that this applies to unclassified, publicly releasable data and, more specifically, data underlying peer-reviewed journal publications. It is understood that much DoD sponsored research will involve sensitive, classified data.

From the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) Policy Statement on Data Sharing in IES Research Centers:

Data sharing provides opportunities for other researchers to review, confirm or challenge study findings, which is an important aspect of the scientific process. In addition, data sharing can enhance scientific inquiry through a variety of other analytic activities, including the use of shared data to: test alternative theories or hypotheses; explore different sets of research questions than those targeted by the original researchers; combine data from multiple sources to provide potential new insights and areas of inquiry; and/or conduct methodological studies to advance education research methods and statistical analyses.

The Office of Science affirms that the following principles related to the management of digital research data directly support fulfillment of its mission.

• Effective data management has the potential to increase the pace of scientific discovery and promote more efficient and effective use of government funding and resources. Data management planning should be an integral part of research planning.
• Sharing and preserving data are central to protecting the integrity of science by facilitating validation of results and to advancing science by broadening the value of research data to disciplines other than the originating one and to society at large. To the greatest extent and with the fewest constraints possible, and consistent with the requirements and other principles of this Statement, data sharing should make digital research data available to and useful for the scientific community, industry, and the public. 
• Not all data need to be shared or preserved. The costs and benefits of doing so should be considered in data management planning.

The Department of Transportation maintains an Open Government and OpenGov Plan website with information about the DOT's progressive series of Open Government Plans. Though perhaps short of a policy, the current open government plan states:

DOT is committed to sharing information and data to encourage opportunities for public feedback, creating opportunities for public participation in the business of DOT, and building opportunities for collaboration and coordination.

(Source: Open Government Plan, Department of Transportation, https://www.transportation.gov/open/plan-chapter1)

In support of open data sharing, the DOT publishes data via data.gov. The department also maintains a list of data repositories which conform with the requirements of the DOT Public Access Plan: https://ntl.bts.gov/publicaccess/repositories.html

Since 2008, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation has promoted a philosophy of Open Access and public data sharing. Specific principles include:

• All data used in or developed in whole or in part by foundation funded projects will be made widely available and freely shared as soon as possible.
• The foundation and prospective grantees will jointly develop a Data Management and Sharing Plan prior to the finalization of a grant agreement.

The IMLS General Terms and Conditions for IMLS Discretionary Grant and Cooperative Agreement Awards for Awards Made After March 1, 2016 state:

Research data sharing is an essential component of research and expedites the translation of research results into new knowledge and practices. 

If you collect and analyze data as part of an IMLS funded project, IMLS expects you to deposit data resulting from IMLS-funded research in a broadly accessible repository that allows the public to use the data without charge no later than the date upon which you submit your final report to IMLS. You should deposit the data in a machine-readable, non-proprietary digital format to maximize search, retrieval, and analysis

From the IMLS General Terms and Conditions: https://www.imls.gov/sites/default/files/gtc_aftermarch2016_03-01.pdf

The Joint Fire Science Program requires submission of a maximum two page DMP with all proposals. From the JFSP application requirements:

It is the intent of the Joint Fire Science Program (JFSP) that all data collected or generated through JFSP funds be of high quality and be made freely available to others within a reasonable time period.

In accordance with its Public Access Plan, NASA policy requires the following:

• All proposals or project plans submitted to NASA for scientific research funding will be required to include a DMP. The DMP should describe whether and how data generated through the course of the proposed research will be shared and preserved (including timeframe), or explain why data sharing and/or preservation are not possible or scientifically appropriate. At a minimum, DMPs must describe how data sharing and preservation will enable validation of published results or how such results could be validated if data are not shared or preserved.
• DMPs must provide a plan for making research data that underlie the results and findings in peer-reviewed publications digitally accessible at the time of publication or within a reasonable time period after publication. This includes data (or how to access data) that are displayed in charts and figures. This does not include preliminary data; laboratory notebooks; drafts of scientific papers, plans for research; peer-review reports; communications with colleagues; or physical objects, such as laboratory specimens. This requirement could be met by including the data as supplementary information to the published article, through NASA archives, or other means. The published article should indicate how these data can be accessed.
• DMPs will be reviewed as part of the overall NASA research proposal/project plan review process.
• NASA program managers will provide guidance to proposers and awardees, as well as monitor compliance with DMPs.

From NASA's Data Management Plans website: https://www.nasa.gov/open/researchaccess/data-mgmt

NEH Office of Digital Humanities DMP requirements are closely modeled after those specified by the NSF Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (NSF-SBE).

With limited exceptions, the NIJ "requires data sets resulting from funded research to be archived with the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD)." Data sets must also be submitted 90 days before the end of the project (http://www.nij.gov/funding/data-resources-program/applying/pages/data-archiving-strategies.aspx).

Applications to the NIJ for research funding must include a 1-2 page data archiving plan submitted as an appendix to the application.

Beginning October, 2014, NIST requires the submission of a Data Management Plan for all funded research. As described in the NIST Public Access Plan released in April, 2015, the DMP will describe how scientific data resulting from the research will be shared and preserved. Alternatively, researchers may provide some rationale for why data sharing and preservation are beyond the scope of their plan. Submitted DMP's should at a minimum provide:

• A summary of activities that generate data.
• A summary of data types generate by the activities.
• Plans for storing and preserving data.
• Plans describing whether and how data will be made publicly accessible.

An updated NIH data management and sharing policy will be in effect for proposals received on or after January 25, 2023. Under this policy, the NIH requires researchers to prospectively plan for how scientific data will be preserved and shared through submission of a Data Management and Sharing Plan. (https://sharing.nih.gov/data-management-and-sharing-policy/about-data-management-and-sharing-policy/data-management-and-sharing-policy-overview) Specifically, investigators are required to:

• Submit a data management and sharing plan
• Comply with the data management and sharing plan

Genomic Data Sharing Policy

On August 26, 2014, the NIH policy on genomic data sharing was published in the Federal Register. An updated NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts was similarly published the following day, with the impact that all funding applications submitted on or after January 25, 2015 will be required to include data-sharing plans that meet the expectations of the policy. This includes the expectation that researchers will obtain informed consent of human subjects for the potential future use and sharing of data while implementing measure to protect private and sensitive data.

Definitions from the NOAA Data Sharing Policy for Grants and Cooperative Agreements, Version 3.0, February 2016:

Environmental Data are recorded and derived observations and measurements of the physical, chemical, biological, geological, and geophysical properties and conditions of the oceans, atmosphere, space environment, sun, and solid earth, as well as correlative data, such as socio-economic data, related documentation, and metadata. Media, including voice recordings and photographs, may be included.

Sharing data refers to making data visible, accessible, and independently understandable to users in a timely manner at minimal cost to users, except where limited by law, regulation, policy or by security requirements. NOAA facilities that archive data and make the data openly available should be considered first for the disposition of the data.

Data Sharing Policy:

Investigators are expected to share with other researchers, at no more than incremental cost and within a reasonable time, the primary data, samples, physical collections and other supporting materials created or gathered in the course of work under NSF grants. Grantees are expected to encourage and facilitate such sharing.

Data Management Plan Requirements

Proposals submitted or due on or after January 18, 2011, must include a supplementary document of no more than two pages labeled “Data Management Plan”. This supplementary document should describe how the proposal will conform to NSF policy on the dissemination and sharing of research results.

The USGS Instructional Memoradum IM OSQI 2015-001 - Foundation Data Policy establishes requirements for data management plans:

• "Plan. The overall project work plan of every research project must include planning for data management (SM 502.2). A data management plan describes standards and intended actions for acquiring, processing, analyzing, preserving, publishing/sharing, describing, managing quality, backing up, and securing the data holdings (http://www.usgs.gov/datamanagement/plan.php). The data management plan, like the work plan, should be updated during the research phase to reflect the reality of the project activities."

A good resource for developing any data management plan is the DMP Tool Online.

By selecting University of New Mexico from the drop down list on the sign in page, you will be able to access templates created by our Data Librarians, as well links to UNM specific recommendations and resources.