Building a Data Services Program and Increasing Data Skills Resiliency with the DSCPE Capstone Program

Marianne Stowell Bracke, Stacy L Winchester 

The Data Services Continuing Professional Education (DSCPE) program is a valuable opportunity that is a structured and immersive program for early and mid-career librarians. It provides a cohort-based approach to learning, providing synchronous and asynchronous learning opportunities, and a capstone project paired with a mentor in the field. It builds resilience in the academic data library community where data services are still a relatively new area. Though there are many examples of good evidencebased practice in the literature, self-study online tutorials, and data specific conferences, engagement between colleagues in this capstone model provides a different level of connection. This presentation describes one capstone project between two libraries, where the mentor institution (University of South Carolina) was in a similar setting to the mentee (Wayne State University) five years earlier. The Wayne State librarian was the first data librarian at the university since the NIH mandate had gone into effect, and there were no data services iin place. The experience and knowledge of the USC librarian presented in the capstone through meetings, instructional sessions, and sharing of resources such as a survey instrument, DMPTool customization, and LibGuides provided the extensive support the Wayne State librarian needed to jumpstart the efforts to identify resources and establish services necessary. The mentor site also benefited from the capstone experience, including assistance with stale LibGuides, a fresh perspective on RDS at another R1 university, and a generous honorarium from the DSCPE. In this presentation, attendees will learn how the DSCPE Capstone Program builds resiliency in the data librarianship community by forming collaborations between university library systems and increasing the opportunities to create long-lasting partnerships that benefit mentor and mentee organizations.