Parallel Session 7 – Libraries Engagement in Co-shaping Policies for All I
Moderator: TBC
Location: Room 2055
7.1) Learning Lab: A Collaborative Dynamic Serving Users and Pedagogical Innovation
Presenter: Natacha Leclercq Varlan, Université de Lille, France
The Learning Lab project provided an opportunity for Lille University libraries to implement co-construction approaches with various stakeholders from the academic community. This initiative aimed to design and build a new space and its associated services tailored to the needs and expectations of users, aligned with the campus ecosystem, and conducive to fostering synergies between pedagogy, research, and mediation. This training and work space, dedicated to experimentation and the dissemination of innovative pedagogical practices, will be located within Agora, the new Humanities and Social Sciences library of the University of Lille currently undergoing renovation. It has been structured around Object-Based Learning (OBL), which places documentary objects in all their forms (print and digital) at the heart of pedagogical practices.
This case study seeks to demonstrate how University libraries in Lille, by engaging in a collaborative and user-centred project approach, succeeded in defining the functional programme of the future Learning Lab through the scenario-based design of future uses. More importantly, this approach allowed for the extensive mobilisation and unification of different stakeholders, resulting in a shared and productive vision of the objectives and missions of a Learning Lab built around a strong concept: Object-Based Learning.
From October 2023 to April 2024, the definition of use scenarios for the future space was carried out using the Design Thinking methodology. This involved alternating phases of divergence and convergence, drawing on the principles of collective intelligence and creativity. The various stages of the process—from immersing with target audiences to prototyping scenarios—actively engaged academics, researchers, educational engineers, librarians, and political bodies to varying extents. The proposed working methods and resulting deliverables were decisive in securing stakeholder buy-in and achieving, in addition to a widely validated and approved functional programme, a supportive environment for advancing the project through its subsequent phases.
By leveraging co-design methods, the University libraries have made the Learning Lab project a demonstrator of emerging collaborative dynamics and a working and practice community among different university stakeholders. This dynamic must be maintained to embark on the next stages of the project (equipment, service policy) and, through appropriate means, be consolidated and sustained to ensure that once open, the space continues to thrive and evolve over time.
7.2) A ‘Railway Guide’ Through the Research Process? A Librarian’s Quest to Create an Overview of All Available Research Support
Presenter: Elisa Rodenburg, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands
At Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, research support is offered in researchers’ faculties, that is, the research-performing units, and at a central level across different divisions, such as the University Library, IT, financial services , grants advice, and the legal department. For researchers, it is often unclear where they should go with questions, who, or what resources, can help them to comply with various requirements, or even why a step is necessary, useful, or good for Open Science.
This is why, in 2021, the University Library took the initiative to create an overview of each research-support-related step that a researcher can take throughout the research process. The University Library is uniquely positioned to create this overview, because it coordinates the university-wide support network for Research Data Management (RDM) and Open Science, it hosts and supports several research applications, and it is the host of the Research Data Management Support Desk, the central helpdesk for all the university’s researchers. The Library therefore plays a central role in engaging researchers and research support staff with RDM, Open Science and other research policies, and fostering collaboration between these colleagues.
The research process overview divides the research process into steps, starting before a grant proposal is written, and ending after the research has been published and data have been deposited in a repository. For each step, the overview shows why, how, where and when a particular step can or must be taken and where a researcher can find support for that step. The steps range from asking for grants advice to publishing data, and from arranging insurance for research participants to setting up a version control system for writing research software; some steps also refer users to other steps. For these reasons, the resulting document is overwhelming, fear-inducing and hard to navigate.
Yet, it is useful. For as far as we know, it is the only document in the university that systematically describes all the research steps and the available support. It is not only helpful for researchers, but also for research support staff who may not be familiar with all the services in the institution. Since 2021, the document has also seen several updates to reflect changes in the support infrastructure, and was used as a source for a project that aims to connect several ‘moments’ of research support, to ease the researcher’s path.
In this presentation, I will show not only the document itself, but also how I went about building it, how I applied Open Science principles to both the creation process and the eventual result, the projects for which the overview was used, how we tried to communicate about the existence of the overview, and what plans we have to work it out more towards a resource that is easier to use. All in all, this document is also a testimony to the unique position of the University Library and the crucial role that it can occupy in (shaping) the research support process.
7.3) Electronic Laboratory Notebooks: A New Challenge for Libraries – The Case of the Université de Lorraine’s Library
Presenter: Elodie Papin, Université de Lorraine, France
Also known as a ‘research notebook’ or ‘scientific experiment notebook’, a laboratory notebook documents day-to-day research activity. It is an integral part of research quality procedures and meets the principles of transparency, reproducibility, traceability, reproducibility, and open research. Since March 2023, the Université de Lorraine has introduced an electronic version of the laboratory notebook for its researchers. Developed by Deltablot, eLabFTW is the free, open-source electronic laboratory notebook (ELN) solution which has been selected. This multi-purpose and customisable tool is designed to serve all the university’s research units, whatever their specific areas of study. The service is coordinated by the University Library with support from IT Department, and Development-Innovation service of the university. It is part of the range of research data management services offered by the ADOC Lorraine support service, which has been awarded the “Atelier de la donnée” label of the French national Recherche Data Gouv ecosystem and led by the library.
The ELN plays an important role in the research data lifecycle, improving the availability of FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) data. ADOC Lorraine has developed the service in a way that is consistent with and echoes the other library services related to research data, making ELN a key element in research data assistance. In addition to promoting the tool to researchers, what are the challenges for libraries in taking up such a subject?
After the implementation of the ELN project at the Université de Lorraine over the past two years, several research units were in favour of fully integrating the ELN into their research activities, either by encouraging their members to use it gradually or simply because the tool met their needs well and was a natural replacement for the paper notebook. In the spring of 2024, ADOC Lorraine carried out a survey of these research units. This survey brings together a number of themes relating to the ELN, research data, and open science, especially the place of the ELN in the data lifecycle and management, with the aim of identifying potential evolutions of the tool and research practices. The results underline the significant role of data librarians in supporting researchers for the adoption of new practices based on FAIR data. More generally, the experience gained at the Université de Lorraine highlights the need for more in-depth work on the metadata of experiments and resources recorded in the ELN. One of the objectives is to publish these inputs with datasets in data repositories, along with ensuring their long-term archiving. The Université de Lorraine is a pioneer in this field in France. This presentation will provide an opportunity to explain how the project came about, how libraries have positioned themselves in this new area and how ELN guidance has become an essential part of support for research data.
“Electronic laboratory notebook: eLabFTW solution”, SCIENCE OUVERTE – Université de Lorraine, 2024, online, https://scienceouverte.univ-lorraine.fr/en/research-data-ul/electronic-laboratory-notebook-elabftw-solution/.