10. Data management plus - organizing data and program files for a university-community partnership

Data management refers to all the small practices that make data easier to find, understand, use, and re-use (Briney, 2015). This includes documenting data, organizing files, and backing up data. This presentation will outline how we organized both research data files and accompanying digital program files from a grant-funded service-learning program, where quasi-experimental data was collected from community members and students who participated in the program over multiple years. While increasingly information science professionals have a sense of best practices for data management and archiving, less attention is paid to the organization of non-data files that compliment research. There are a variety of digital files that support the program, this includes written documents pertaining to program development, training materials, contracts, and recruitment of participants. In our particular case, the service-learning program did not start out with a clear plan for organizing the data or the digital files. This presentation will share how we went from ad-hoc file organization to a more streamlined system, not only utilizing practices from research data management but also integrating ideas from personal knowledge management (PKM) and business "self-help" books.