JISC

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Repositories Start-Up Project

The project will create an institutional and publicly available repository of College committee records, hosted on the web. The project will explore key technical questions; address practical issues about creating and uploading records and answer essential questions about managing security and confidentiality.

The project addresses a common concern across HE – how can vital, but extensive committee records, be effectively managed, stored, and made available?

Aims and Objectives

Committee records are a vital source of information across higher education. At King’s College London, committees provide strategic policy development and fulfil planning, audit and governance functions. Their activities cover the full range of the College’s work and their records provide a core account of how the College manages its academic and business interests.

King’s committees, like those in most HEIs, create numerous records that are administered in varied ways. These records raise a number of management concerns. For instance, agendas, minutes and papers in both hard-copy and electronic form proliferate across College. The sheer volume inhibits effective cross-College communication and raises concerns about storage. In addition committee records can be difficult to search and use, especially since minutes are now rarely indexed.

With these concerns in view, the project will establish an online repository for committee records that will:

• Contribute to the ready availability of key management data and strengthen executive decision making
• Promote organisational transparency (including compliance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000)
• Reduce redundancy in record keeping and in printing out
• Allow for the systematic maintenance and storage of a permanent committee archive

Project Methodology

The project will explore key technical questions (which repository? what format? which metadata?); address practical issues about creating and uploading records and answer essential questions about managing security and confidentiality when publishing potentially sensitive data. It will address preservation concerns by looking to long-term archive storage and access issues. The project addresses a common concern across the sector about how vital but extensive committee records may be effectively managed, stored and maintained and made available. It will build on best practice and make use of current technology and will contribute a case study of high relevance across the HE sector and a range of essential outputs.

The project is scheduled to start in July 2007. Progress updates and periodic reports can be found on the project website. Alternatively, email the Project Researcher for more information.

Anticipated Outputs and Outcomes

The project will serve as a case study for the HE sector. Achievements will include:

• A fully tested workflow for publishing committee records, transferable to any HEI
• A report on key themes and issues including repository software, formats, metadata and search tools
• A case study on preservation options along with a specification of needs
• A searchable online archive of core committee records

Technology/Standards Used

Metadata

There are a number of model metadata schemas across the library, archive and information management sector, though few are directly applicable to administrative records. The project will look in particular at the NAA (National Archives of Australia) metadata standard and at our own e-GMS (e-government metadata standard).

Any metadata set generated by the project will be cross-walked to EAD for archive portability.

Format

The project will explore the relative merits of PDF and ODF.

Software

The project will make use of Brandworkz digital asset management software to store and publish the records. FEDORA will also be explored as an alternative.