RDM Weekly - Issue 022
A weekly roundup of Research Data Management resources.
Welcome to Issue 22 of the RDM Weekly Newsletter!
The content of this newsletter is divided into 3 categories:
✅ What’s New in RDM?
These are resources that have come out within the last year or so
✅ Oldies but Goodies
These are resources that came out over a year ago but continue to be excellent ones to refer to as needed
✅ Just for Fun
A data management meme or other funny data management content
What’s New in RDM?
Resources from the past year
1. Coffee & Quality: Finding Your Source of Truth
In this one hour webinar for the United Way of Houston, Albert Espinoza explores how conflicting data sources show up across organizations, the risks of misalignment, and how to define and manage a “source of truth.” Alberto shares many takeaways along with a practical checklist to make sure your data is accurate, timely, accessible, owned, documented, and trusted, and reminds attendees to normalize asking, “What’s the source?”.
2. WUR FAIR Data Cheatsheet
Developed by Wageningen University & Research, this cheatsheet makes creating FAIR data easier than ever. Follow this short list of steps to start making your data findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable. The authors acknowledge that this resource was inspired by the Utrecht University FAIR cheatsheets.
3. How to Develop and Use Open Educational Resources
This chapter explores the critical role of Open Educational Resources (OERs) in advancing open science and promoting educational equity. OERs are freely-available teaching and learning materials that can be reused and adapted, making them powerful tools for democratising access to knowledge. This chapter outlines five foundational principles for OER development—accessibility, inclusivity, collaboration, sustainability, and social justice—and offers a step-by-step framework for creating, implementing, and sustaining high-quality OERs. Case studies are presented to demonstrate participatory and community-driven approaches to OER creation. The authors also examine common challenges such as structural inequality and linguistic barriers, providing actionable strategies for addressing each. By embedding values of openness, fairness, and co-creation, we show how OERs can help reshape curricula and cultivate more inclusive academic ecosystems.
4. Open Research: Examples of Good Practice, and Resources Across Disciplines
Open research is best described as “an umbrella term used to refer to the concepts of openness, transparency, rigor, reproducibility, replicability, and accumulation of knowledge” (Crüwell et al., 2019, p. 3). Although a lot of open research practices have commonly been discussed under the term “open science”, open research applies to all disciplines. If the concept of open research is new to you, it might be difficult for you to determine how you can apply open research practices to your research. The aim of this document (last updated October 20th, 2025), from the UK Reproducibility Network, is to provide resources and examples of open research practices that are relevant to your discipline. The document lists case studies of open research per discipline, and resources per discipline (organised as: general, open methods, open data, open output and open education). The resources from this document are also available as webpages, that can be searched by discipline.
5. Datanomy
Datanomy is a terminal-based tool for inspecting and understanding data files. It provides an interactive view of your data’s structure, metadata, and internal organization. It is currently available for Parquet files and can be installed from source or from PyPI. You can check out a demonstration of the project from the creator, Raul Cumplido.
6. Beyond the Science: The Role of Project Management in Stronger Grants
In this webinar, Rachael Sabelli discusses the role that project management, and specifically hiring/assigning a designated project manager, plays in having a successful research project. Rachael suggests that PIs (Principal Investigators) don’t often have the capacity, and often times the skill set, to execute the grant as proposed within their given timeline. PIs are often juggling too many things, and if you are an early career researcher, you may not know how to manage a project yet. Project managers help ensure that your grant actually comes to fruition.
Oldies but Goodies
Older resources that are still helpful
1. Empowering Education Research: The POWER of Collaboration and Open Science
In this Center for Open Science guest blog post, the organizers of the POWER (Providing Opportunities for Women in Education Research) Issues in Data Management in Education Research Hub provide insight into why organizations like POWER are important for the education research community and how their hub in particular has impacted data management knowledge and implementation for researchers in their field, and the broader research community as well.
2. Ten Simple Rules for Reproducible Computational Research
This article is over a decade old and is still very relevant today. Replication is the cornerstone of a cumulative science. However, new tools and technologies, massive amounts of data, interdisciplinary approaches, and the complexity of the questions being asked are complicating replication efforts, as are increased pressures on scientists to advance their research. As full replication of studies on independently collected data is often not feasible, there has recently been a call for reproducible research as an attainable minimum standard for assessing the value of scientific claims. This requires that papers in experimental science describe the results and provide a sufficiently clear protocol to allow successful repetition and extension of analyses based on original data. This article presents ten simple rules for reproducibility of computational research. These rules can be at your disposal for whenever you want to make your research more accessible—be it for peers or for your future self.
3. Three Myths About Open Science That Just Won’t Die
Knowledge and implementation of open science principles and behaviors remains uneven across the sciences, despite over 10 years of intensive education and advocacy. One reason for the slow and uneven progress of the open science movement is a set of closely held myths about the implications of open science practices, bolstered by recurring objections and arguments that have long been addressed. This paper covers three of these major recurring myths: 1) that open science conflicts with prioritizing diversity, 2) that “open data” is a binary choice between fully open and accessible and completely closed off, and 3) that preregistration is only appropriate for certain types of research designs. Putting these myths to rest is necessary as we work towards improving our scientific practice.
4. Using Qualtrics Effectively
This slide deck is an extremely thorough overview of using the Qualtrics survey platform. It covers a variety of topics including navigating the platform, survey development options, testing and validating data, and distribution. This slide deck is part of a larger page of resources provided by George Mason University Libraries.
Just for Fun
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Every issue is SO good! Wow!