Date

10-24-2008

Document Type

PowerPoint Presentation

Medical Subject Headings

Libraries, Digital; Libraries, Medical; University of Massachusetts Medical School; Lamar Soutter Library; Institutional repositories; Digitization

Disciplines

Library and Information Science

Abstract

Our presentation will describe the process and costs associated with our first digitization project: digitizing 300 doctoral dissertations for a newly implemented institutional repository at UMass Medical School. We will start at the beginning: selecting team members and identifying their roles, choosing the right repository system, and identifying a manageable first project. We will explain how we partnered with our Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and contacted alumni for permission to digitize their dissertations. We will also discuss technical information and decisions such as software and equipment used to scan and create searchable text, using OCR technology to convert abstracts, deciding what metadata to collect, and how to re-use data from our OPAC. We will describe workflow and skill level of staff members and the coordination required between the Library’s Systems and Technical Services departments. Finally we will present the costs associated with this work. We conclude that locally digitizing dissertations or other scholarly works for inclusion into institutional repositories can be cost effective and an excellent recruitment strategy for the institutional repository.

Presented October 28, 2008 in Worcester, Mass., at the program "Introduction to Library Digitization" sponsored by the Massachusetts Library Association's Technical Services Section.

Additional Files
Visio File Process.pdf (13 kB)
Flow chart of systems and cataloging processes used during the project
Score Card.pdf (22 kB)
"Score card" used to rate and evaluate repository systems