Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Developing Standards and Changing Practices for Libraries and Universities

Robert E. Wolverton Jr, Lona Hoover, Susan Hall, Robert Fowler

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780789031754
• eBook ISBN: 9781317994343
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Library & Information Science
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

As open access initiatives, electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) provide Internet access to graduate student research documents from hundreds of academic institutions, thus furthering international scholarly communication. The last decade has seen change and collaboration among colleagues of varied disciplines and across institutional boundaries. There is a need for practical information for academics, database managers and library catalogers in dealing with the complexities of developing ETD programs and workflow. The authors present a comprehensive treatise on ETDs, drawing on many years of collective experience within this specialization.

This book was published as a special issue of Technical Services Quarterly.

Chapter 1

ETDs: From the Beginning

INTRODUCTION

Through engaging in electronic thesis and dissertation (ETD) initiatives, graduate school administrators, librarians, faculty advisors and research personnel of institutions across the United States and internationally have joined in efforts to enhance the visibility and accessibility of the graduate research documents produced within their academic departments. While there has been great progress in the movement to publish electronic versions of graduate student work, a number of potential barriers may contribute to a slowdown in the number of institutions embarking in these new programs. Infrastructure, technical support and solid communication across diverse campus units are among the necessary elements of a successful program, but a clear discussion of pitfalls and practical issues is needed and is presented here for those institutions in start-up mode. In later chapters of the book, the authors explore the recent history of treatment and cataloging of theses and dissertations in academic libraries, analyze survey results from nation-wide questionnaires, examine studies and trends in an attempt to perceive an evolution of practice since the advent of ETDs, discuss issues and new research in authority control in the cataloging of TDs/ETDs, and provide a detailed, updated review of the professional literature. Cited throughout the work are core resources for support and information, as institutional projects mature. Also addressed are an array of issues that may inhibit progress in ETD initiatives, and how these difficulties may be resolved.

As universities examine their position and readiness to develop such an initiative, it is likely that some member of the constituent groups will raise the question, “What is an ETD; why develop an ETD program?” What are the advantages, given the necessary time investment in communication and training, and the political issues of re-examining or reinventing unit procedures? Perhaps an overworked graduate student will see the new electronic publishing requirement as another hurdle or mystery to solve before achieving the desired goal, the graduate degree. Faculty advisors, engaged in research programs, busy with deadlines for journal articles and research reports, will not always welcome the disruption of prior routines for what may seem an experimental program. It is very important to recognize and address these and other concerns. Certainly, librarians are faced with many opportunities and challenges in the development of ETD programs. It is hoped that the information provided here will address some of these questions and issues, easing the transition to new services and new models for scholarly communication.

The familiar and traditional paper version of the thesis or dissertation (TD) that is bound and shelved in libraries differs from the electronic version, which is also approved, published, cataloged and indexed. However, because the ETD resides in electronic form, it has the capacity for wide distribution and may include embedded media, audio files, video, and specialized fonts, graphs or spreadsheets imported from software. Also, electronic links within documents can be utilized. ETD programs vary with institutional strengths and resources; some university program priorities go further to provide for full text searching within their ETD documents. MIT and other institutions have begun retrospective conversions of older theses and dissertations to electronic form by scanning and digitally storing files from the paper copy. Because these files require much more storage capacity, (Fox, UNESCO ETD Guide), this type of project is both labor intensive and more expensive than projects that focus on student generated ETDs. For the most part, ETDs as discussed here are those that are “born digital,” created by the author as electronic documents to be published, indexed, and archived on institutional facilities.

What are the advantages in access and distribution for ETD programs? At the point of document submission, the student author and faculty advisors should discuss several options for access and display of the ETD. The clear advantage is the widest distribution of research documents with unrestricted access on the Web; this is recommended as the option in closest compliance with the goals of ETD initiatives. The student uses the university ETD Web site to load the document for review and approval, at which time the ETD is available for public viewing, printing and downloading via the Web. A second option, campus intranet access only, mimics to a degree the access patterns available in university library settings for traditional TDs. As the reader in the physical library must be on location with the print TD (or access a copy via interlibrary loan), the researcher viewing an ETD via campus intranet must have authorization through the local network. With a user login, a university identification code and password, affiliated researchers may view the document, much like being permitted to browse in the library stacks for a paper version. This intranet campus access might be chosen if the author anticipates future publication of the work that necessitates a more limited audience for some period of time, such as a forthcoming monograph or journal article. A third restricted access option allows for selected university personnel to view the work on an as-needed basis, for administrative purposes. This option is chosen if the work documents proprietary information, such as a pending patent application. Often there are guidelines set for the most restricted access (UNESCO ETD Guide). These restrictions may involve time limits for the restriction period, the process by which documents are released to wider audiences, or procedures for gaining approval to employ restrictions.

EARLY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE ETD MOVEMENT

The role that key individuals and institutions took in events driving the development of electronic publishing to the forefront should be examined. From an early meeting in 1987 on using Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) hosted by University Microfilms (now ProQuest), throughout the 1990’s (Allard, 2003), efforts to engage universities in developing electronic archives including theses and dissertations were discussed. In 1993, the Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA) awarded Virginia Tech a grant of about $90,000 for the Monticello Electronic Library project. With the availability of Adobe Acrobat software in 1994, consensus began to emerge regarding PDF as a free, user-friendly tool for use in creating ETDs. Virginia Tech remained the lead institution with the award in 1996 of a three year Fund for the Improvement of Post Secondary Education (FIPSE) grant project, “Improving Graduate Education with the National Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations” (Kipp, Fox, McMillan, 1999). The NDLTD digital library initiative, now known as the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations, was established through the efforts of project director, Edward Fox, Professor of Computer Science at Virginia Tech. Other key members of the 1996 Virginia Tech initiative were John Eaton, Associate Provost for Graduate Studies, Gail McMillan, University Libraries, and Neill Kipp, doctoral student in Computer Science. Continued leadership in promoting ETD programs has also been provided by the Coalition for Networked Information and the Council of Graduate Schools.

THE NDLTD

On the organization’s Web site, www.ndltd.org, NDLTD provides a brief history of the international consortium, as well as a membership directory, bylaws, and presentations about the organization with resource and contact information for those interested in joining the initiative. Among the primary goals of NDLTD are: to enhance graduate student education to include electronic publishing skills and experience, preparing students for full involvement in an information age; to reduce costs associated with prior TD practices in creating, printing, binding and storing paper documents; to engage universities in learning about digital collections and to adapt university policies so that the full potential of intellectual property can be realized; to enable student innovation and expression in research documents; and to enhance knowledge and education by increasing access to current research documents worldwide. The consortium offers annual membership fees to corporations, individuals, universities, and multi-campus institutions on a sliding scale.

NDLTD and its member organizations maintain a digital library of consortium holdings that are continually updated as member institutions approve and publish new thesis or dissertation documents. The limited exposure that is typical for the traditional print TD shelved in one institutional library means that data, those survey results or discussion of research methodology remains relatively unknown in comparison to the potential for Web viewing. Also extremely valuable is the literature review presented within ETDs. Researchers can conduct a topic search at the NDLTD site for holdings across institutional libraries and gain immediate access to the full text documents of interest. The simplicity of a central search option enhances the visibility of graduate research documents, and potentially decreases the time to discovery (Fox, UNESCO ETD Guide) and further citing of the new works. The NDLTD site also provides links to additional resources and services. Some institutions provide access to their graduate research documents through home or separate consortium sites. For example, MIT allows for authorized campus use or fee based delivery of their theses and dissertations, while the North Carolina State and OhioLink ETD websites are open access, free of cost (w­w­w­.l­i­b­.n­c­s­u­.­e­d­u­/­e­t­d­/­a­n­d­­w­w­w­.o­h­i­o­l­i­n­k­.e­d­u­/­e­t­d­/­).

The key concept and motivation behind the ETD project is the advancement of knowledge to match the full potential in the use of technology, and to have a positive impact on scholarly communication. ETDs are enhanced documents, with the capacity for innovation and expression; they can be zoomed in for larger font use by the visually impaired. The ease with which they are accessed and shared is in great contrast to the historical picture of scholarly communication prior to internet use. ETDs play a major role in changing the nature of scholarly communication, in emphasizing the training of the next generation of scholars in electronic publishing skill sets. Evident in comparison, the barriers of more traditional modes of scholarly communication are considerable.

TRADITIONAL MODELS OF SCHOLARLY COMMUNICATION

Libraries have been and remain at the heart of the campus and at the center of research activity. While distributed electronic resources available through campus networks no longer limit the library to one place, the integral role of library resources remains core to research endeavors. Prior to the networked environment, however, the pace was much slower. Research and literature review involved the consultation of print indexes, some of which were months or years behind the queue of the newest scholarship in press. For this reason, faculty often relied upon informal communication networks among colleagues, requesting reprints or tear sheets of new journal articles on postcards sent through the mail. Before WorldCat, before OCLC, interlibrary loan offices corresponded by telephone or postal service to request materials, relying occasionally upon printed union catalogs and some luck to fill interlibrary loan requests. While this model seems quaint, it is not yet entirely irrelevant; scholars in under-developed regions lagging in technological infrastructure still struggle within limitations of this magnitude. Fast forward to the current moment, where university and organizational websites provide access to electronic theses and dissertations, perhaps with five or ten years of archived material. The Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations provides free access to such current scholarship, continually updating site holdings as new documents are approved within the consortium’s member universities. In under-developed economies where barriers to costly information resources prevail and hinder the scientist, the current nature of the research within ETDs and the availability of these documents to any reader with access to the World Wide Web provides a boost, at least a partial remedy to the situation.

The relevance of the ETD or digital dissertation in providing a review of current literature, readily available for print or download, is often overlooked. Faculty advisors may see the dissertation as an initial entry in the professional literature. Consider, however, the utility and availability of the ETD in terms of students mapping out research projects and proposals. The systematic publication of ETDs by major research institutions allows students to investigate topics in detail from the outset. By federated search at the NDLTD site or by searching high profile programs specializing in the student author’s interest to determine whether a proposal topic has been addressed, the ETD user is able to move more quickly to uncharted ground. Nothing is so devastating for a graduate student as locating a prior publication or a completed dissertation on a selected topic after spending extensive time in proposal preparation, developing or conducting approved survey instruments, or in summarizing research results.

The value of the ETD or digital dissertation can be overlooked by reference librarians in conducting literature searches as well. Attempting to construct a unified database query or single strategy to employ in federated searching across various index structures is not always successful. The alternative, conducting individual searches designed for each database that acknowledge variant or unique field parameters is, of course, very time consuming. Removing duplicate results also requires a time investment. An excellent review of the literature found in the references of an ETD or digital dissertation can provide an important entry into related literature, or a jump-start to a particular topic.

THE FUTURE OF SCHOLARLY COMMUNICATION

The effect of the ETD movement, a broad based campaign increasing student involvement in open access web publishing, has dramatic implications for the future of scholarly communication. Enhancing student skills in electronic publishing means a greater potential for future professional involvement in the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition or SPARC (www.arl.org/sparc) and other open source initiatives. Within the networked environment of universities, the foundation exists for faculty and research scientists to engage in scholarly publishing via electronic journals that are peer reviewed. This move sidesteps any system that charges a faculty member hefty fees for each journal article submitted. As the cost to university libraries for subscription fees spiral outside normal inflation rates, escalating budgets reach levels that cannot be sustained. Libraries and universities have been caught for decades in a downward trend of reducing or realigning scholarly resources for academic programs, as increasing fees for research materials and decreasing library budget buying power create a trap. Over the last decade, significant technology investments and commitments in licensing for electronic indexes and resources have taken a larger and larger share of the available dollars. Budgets for monographs and staff resources have been hard hit. Consequently, faculty research support erodes where the alternative is yet another round of cuts in journal subscriptions.

The role of the peer review process remains central to scholarly communication, whether examining historical models or within the current electronic environment. The achievements of scholarship are benchmarked by the presentation and communication of new works to be examined, critiqued, and discussed within the discipline’s chosen medium for the exchange of ideas. In the physical sciences, journal article publication dominates that benchmarking process, while in the humanities a long-range slower process may be taken in authoring monographs. Musicians and art faculty create works and organize performances, exhibits, and displays; the literature of architecture is also influenced by both the published, cited work and the created, built environment. The unifying element across the varied disciplines is that the scholarly work is posited, stated, published, performed, or created in an environment of review and discussion. A lingering concern that some faculty may hold in program shifts to ETDs and electronic publishing is the notion that the peer review element and consequent impact of a work may be diminished somehow if it is available free on the Web. While it is tru...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Authors' Preface
• 1. ETDs: From the Beginning
• 2. The Development and Assessment of ETD Initiatives
• 3. Historical Perspectives on the Treatment and Cataloging of Print Theses and Dissertations
• 4. Cataloging and Treatment of ETDs
• 5. Issues of Name Authority Control in the Cataloging of Theses and Dissertations
• 6. Theses/Dissertations and ETD Cataloging: An Annotated Bibliography
• Index