Importance of Research Data and RDM

Research data management plans are important for ECU because they provide transparency and accountability in the way research data is collected, stored, and shared.

A research data management plan ensures that data is stored securely, sustainably, and responsibly and that it is accessible to the people who need it. This provides increased certainty both for researchers, in terms of long-term use and archiving of their research data, and for research participants, in terms of upholding appropriate security for data that might have implications for their privacy. By having a set of guidelines in place, ECU can be confident that research data is managed responsibly.

Additionally, having a research data management plan helps to ensure the accuracy and integrity of research data over time, which is essential for making sure that the research results are accessible for other researchers. Having a data management plan can also help to reduce the amount of time and effort needed to manage research data, allowing researchers to focus on the more important aspects of their work.

ECU recognizes data as an important research output and is committed to fostering excellence in research data management (RDM) and its associated practices including:

Creating data management plans as required to describe how research data will be managed and documented throughout a research project.
Ensuring that the data management plan is executed or modified over the course of a research project.
Storing data in secure, reliable networks with strong back-up and redundancy.
Describing and documenting data in ways that can be understood beyond a given research team.
Understanding legal and ethical obligations related to private data, cultural data, and intellectual property.
Developing clear and comprehensive agreements regarding the ownership and sharing of project data.
Publicly sharing data for reuse where possible.
Providing appropriate software tools and training for student and faculty researchers.