Learning As We Go, Go, Go: Reflections from Developing and Delivering an Early Adopter Program for a Shared Repository Service in Canada
Abstract
Scholaris is a new national opt-in shared repository service that aims to support open discovery, management, sharing and preservation of Canadian scholarship by providing scalable infrastructure, technical expertise and community support for Canadian institutional repositories. The service is being developed by the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL), the Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL) and the University of Toronto Libraries (UTL), in collaboration with regional consortia and the broader repository community. The shared technical infrastructure, built on the DSpace platform, is hosted and managed by Scholars Portal at UTL. In the Spring of 2024, we launched an Early Adopter Program to work with institutions representing a wide range of repository and migration scenarios and through that process, better understand what’s needed to support Canadian IRs from a service perspective. From previous feasibility studies, we knew there was interest in a shared repository service but the program uptake far exceeded our expectations. Over the last year and a half, we’ve onboarded, migrated, and launched more than twenty institutions (!) —and we’ve learned a lot along the way. In this presentation, we’ll share how we’ve project managed a myriad of migrations, what we’ve learned from working closely with our wonderful Early Adopters and Network of Expert Groups, and how these insights are informing the on-going evolution and delivery of the service and the development of community resources and recommendations.
Full text
Learning As We Go, Go, Go: Reflections from Developing and Delivering an Early Adopter Program for a Shared Repository Service in Canada Northeast Institutional Repository Day NIRD 2025 Julia Gilmore, Digital Projects Librarian, Scholars Portal University of Toronto) scholaris.ca
Pilot Project and Early Adopter Program Software: DSpace Laying the groundwork ●Provincial and national feasibility studies ●Demonstrated interest in shared repository infrastructure ●Pilot project with 2 OCUL institutions Summer 2023 ●Agreement to develop shared service model Fall 2023 Exploration and Feasibility Studies Governance, Expert Groups: CARL, SRIAC Service Provider: Scholars Portal UTL Pilot Project 2022 2023 MOU Signed Spring 2024 Early Adopter Program Network of Experts December 2025 We are here!
A brief overview of Scholaris Technical Infrastructure Community Infrastructure ●Parallel instances of DSpace ●Centrally hosted and managed by Scholaris Scholars Portal) ●Focus: building a scalable, efficient, affordable & flexible service model ●Early Adopter Program ●Scholaris Network of Expert Groups ●Participation in Canadian, international, DSpace repository communities and initiatives
Key Points ●Scholaris helps repository teams support their scholarly communities. ●Scholaris is a repository service, not a single repository platform or discovery layer. ●Scholaris provides technical and community infrastructure to subscribing institutions. ●Local repository teams manage the daily operations of their repository and have flexibility to add desired customizations and integrations (supported within the service model) to meet the needs of their own communities. More information: Scholaris Communications Kit EN | FR on SPOTDocs Scholaris as a Service: Centralized Service Delivery, Hosting, Technical and Community Support Institution 1 Institution 4Institution 3Institution 2 Institution 5
Scholaris Network of Expert Groups ●Scholaris Metadata and Discovery Expert Group SMDEG ○Established Spring 2024 ○Focuses on identifying metadata best practices and developing recommendations to enhance the discoverability and interoperability of repository content. ●Scholaris Electronic Theses and Dissertations Expert Group SETEG ○Established Spring 2024 ○Works on developing recommendations, guidelines, and workflows for effective migration and management of ETDs. ●Scholaris Digital Preservation Expert Group SDPEG ○Established Summer 2024 ○Concentrates on providing recommendations and guidance on digital preservation protocols and pathways to support long-term access to content in Scholaris repositories.
Scholaris Network of Expert Groups Find published recommendations on TSpace (utoronto.scholaris.ca): Scholaris Network of Expert Reports Expert Group Published Guidance/Outputs Upcoming Scholaris Metadata & Discovery Expert Group SMDEG ●Cleaning Metadata for Migration ●Minimum Viable Metadata MVM ●Multilingual Metadata ●Entities Guidance and Advice ●Briefing Document on Persistent Identifiers ●Entities Guidance v2 ●Standard submission forms aligned with MVM guidance Scholaris Electronic Theses and Dissertations Expert Group SETEG ●Guidance on LAC Requirements for Harvesting Theses & Dissertations ●ETD Needs Assessment Survey ●Addressing Non-Traditional Theses ●ETD Workflows ●ETD Needs Assessment Summary Report Scholaris Digital Preservation Expert Group SDPEG ●Risk Management Matrix (internal) ●Digital Preservation DP Explainers ●DP Needs Assessment Survey ●DP Policy Environmental Scan ●DSpace/Scholaris Preservation Features Sheet and Glossary ●DP Needs Assessment Summary Report ●Preservation Service Offering Guidance ●DP Toolkit ●Scholaris Preservation Policy
And now letʼs go back a moment…
Early Adopter Program 20242026 Program Eligibility Open to Canadian academic universities representing various repository use cases. Goals and expected outputs ○Migrate institutions to Scholaris technical infrastructure ○Define workflows and roadmaps for efficient migrations and on-going service delivery ○Define service offering (i.e., default, optional, supported/not supported) ○Estimate costs and resources to establish pricing model and operate on cost-recovery basis ○And also… learn DSpace! Pilot Cohort 1 Cohort 2 Cohort 3 Fall 2023 Summer 2024 Fall 2024 Spring 2025 Cohort 4 Fall 2025 Winter 2026 Cohort 5
…if we build it, will they (institutions) come?
○Offering flexible levels of support ■Hosting training, share resources, hop on a call to walk-through questions. ■Supporting repository teams with a range of technical expertise and capacity ○“ABDˮ - Always Be Documenting ■Writing things down and publishing documentation ■Encouraging Scholaris community-contributed documentation, creating areas and opportunities to share ■Sharing DSpace documentation, Expert Groupsʼ guidance, etc. Key Takeaways: Whatʼs Worked Well ○Embracing and cultivating community ■Growing Scholaris community via monthly community calls, working hours, special interest sessions ■Collaborating with Scholaris Expert Groups and Canadian IR network ■Participating in and contributing to the DSpace community ●DCAT, Developer Meetings ●Understanding where to look for help ●Creating and reviewing GitHub tickets ■Saying thank you :) Weʼre having a lot of fun being part of the IR and DSpace community!
Highlights from the Early Adopter Program ○Launched 20 institutions on Scholaris infrastructure over the last 2 years ○Completed 3 DSpace version upgrades (most recently: DSpace 8.2 ○Configured integrations for DOIs and ORCID ○Updated OAI crosswalks and configured harvesting of ETDs into Theses Canada program ○Hosted a yearsʼ worth of Scholaris Community Calls and started Configurable Entities Working Hours to meet growing interest from repository teams ○Published a lot of documentation! ○Developed on-going pricing model, Scholaris Terms of Use, and Privacy Statement
Live on Scholaris ●Algoma University ●Bishopʼs University ●Brock University ●Cape Breton University ●Carleton University ●Laurentian University ●Memorial University ●Mount Allison University ●NSCAD University ●Ontario Tech University Thank you to our Early Adopters In Progress ●Athabasca University ●McGill University ●Queenʼs University ●Toronto Metropolitan University ●Université du Québec à Montréal ●St. Francis Xavier University ●Université de Moncton ●Université de Montréal ●University of Alberta ●University of Calgary ●University of Regina ●Université de Sherbrooke ●University of Toronto ●University of Windsor ●Western University
…and to our Network of Experts Scholaris Metadata & Discovery Expert Group SMDEG Scholaris Electronic Theses and Dissertations Expert Group SETEG Scholaris Digital Preservation Expert Group SDPEG Current members: ●Jordan Pedersen (co-chair, University of Guelph) ●Mike Nason (co-chair, University of New Brunswick) ●Caitlin Bakker University of Regina) ●Teresa Bascik Université de Montréal) ●Cindy Beauchesne-Jolin Université de Sherbrooke) ●Pascal Calarco University of Windsor) ●Robin Desmeules McGill University) ●Sharon Farnel University of Alberta) ●Laura Smart Western University) ●Carolyn Sullivan University of Ottawa) Past members: ●Carl Brouillard Université de Sherbrooke) ●Kathryn West National Research Council Canada) Current members: ●Carrie Breton (co-chair, University of Guelph) ●Pascal Calarco (co-chair, University of Windsor) ●Laurence Charest Université de Montréal) ●Émilié Chouinard Érudit ●Matt Dumouchel Western University) ●Sean McLaughlin Library and Archives of Canada) Past members: ●Leah Vanderjagt (past co-chair, University of Alberta) ●Nicole White (past co-chair, Simon Fraser University) ●Jen Whitney Carleton University) Current members: ●Julie Shi (chair, Scholars Portal) ●Corey Davis University of Victoria) ●Kenton Good University of Alberta) ●Andrea Szwajcer University of Manitoba) ●Steve Marks University of Toronto) ●Leanne Olson Western University) ●Victoria Volkanova Université de Moncton) Past members: ●Amelia Ritchie University of Windsor) ●Kate Langrell University of Saskatchewan) Ex officio ●Julia Gilmore Scholars Portal) ●Susan Haigh CARL ●Geoff Harder University of Alberta) ●Elizabeth Kalbfleisch CARL ●Gabriela Mircea University of Calgary | VPO, Metadata Strategies & Scholaris)
●Service delivery ○Shifting from primarily migration-focused work towards ongoing support ●Governance modelling ●Preservation support within service model ●Increasing investment and involvement in DSpace community ●Supporting Canadian repository community with updated Tri-Agency Open Access Policy mandates ●Continuing to grow and tend to the Scholaris community Beyond the Early Adopter Program: The Road Ahead
Thank you! Questions about Scholaris? inf[email protected] Scholaris Service Team Scholars Portal) ● Julia Gilmore, Digital Projects Librarian Scholaris Service Lead) ● Mohana Sarmiento, SysAdmin - DevOps Scholaris Technical Lead) ● Rachel Wang, SysAdmin ● Weronika Kubica Scholaris Student Library Assistant) With guidance and support from: ●Gabriela Mircea University of Calgary, CARL VPO for Metadata Strategies and Scholaris) ●Kate Davis Director, Scholars Portal) ●Scholars Portal Systems Team