Connections Needed

By actively fostering connections through partnerships, securing funding, and building a strong community, a data help desk can significantly enhance its reach, impact, and sustainability in supporting researchers with their data management needs.

Partnerships with institutions and organizations

  • Collaborations with universities, research institutions, and other organizations are vital for a data help desk to leverage a wider range of expertise and resources. The Open Science & Data Help Desk at the AGU Fall Meeting, for example, is a program of the Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) and the American Geophysical Union (AGU), along with their partners. The EGU’s Open Science & Data Help Desk also involves ESIP and AGU.
  • These partnerships can bring a diversity of volunteers to staff the help desk, representing various organizations and topics. This ensures a broader range of expertise is available to answer diverse user questions.
  • Establishing an active relationship with key contacts at the organization hosting the meeting is crucial for planning, executing, and maximizing the impact of the data help desk. This includes ensuring prominent placement in meeting materials and exploring opportunities for further promotion.
  • The data help desk can be positioned as a “program of” key contributing organizations like ESIP, the meeting host (e.g., AGU, GSA, EGU), and potentially EarthCube. This acknowledges the significant effort and resources these entities provide.
  • Collaborations can also extend to specific sections within meeting host organizations or initiatives like Career Central.
  • Organizations like the Science Gateways Community Institute (SGCI) support academic communities in developing websites and software, offering a potential partnership for help desks that include a software component.
  • The ESIP Physical Samples Curation Cluster is another example of a community focused on a specific aspect of Earth science data, highlighting the potential for partnerships with such focused groups.
  • The involvement of members from ESIP Collaboration Areas, such as the Marine Data Cluster for the Ocean Sciences Meeting, demonstrates how existing networks can contribute to the success of a domain-focused help desk.

Networking and community building

  • The data help desk provides opportunities for researchers to engage with informatics experts in their scientific domain. This direct interaction facilitates knowledge sharing and skill development.
  • It also enables researchers to connect with other scientists and data professionals, fostering a sense of community around data management best practices.
  • Crowdsourcing responses by involving a diverse group of volunteers brings valuable perspectives and can often provide a lead even when a definitive answer isn’t immediately available.
  • Creating a Slack channel specifically for data help desk experts allows for backchannel conversation, knowledge sharing, and triaging of questions, especially for those less comfortable with public platforms like Twitter. This also allows experts who are monitoring questions to provide input that organizers can then share.
  • Encouraging volunteers to share their science expertise alongside their informatics knowledge is important for establishing trust and starting conversations with researchers.
  • Planning a special meetup with food can be an effective way to attract a crowd and encourage interaction.
  • The help desk can act as a low-barrier entry point for researchers to improve their data management practices and connect with the broader Earth science data community.
  • Offering opportunities for emerging and early career researchers to volunteer not only supports the help desk but also helps these individuals gain valuable experience, build connections, and contribute to the open science community.
  • Consider expanding post-conference support (via Slack or webinars) to enable ongoing assistance and build a continuous engagement beyond the event itself.
  • The ESIP Slack workspace itself serves as a broader community forum for networking and collaboration among Earth science data professionals.

Funding and sponsorships

  • Grants and sponsorships are essential to support the operation of the data help desk and related activities. The work of the Data Help Desk is supported in part by NSF grants and other supporting agencies, including AGU, EGU, and ESA. ESIP itself is supported by NASA, NOAA, and the USGS.
  • Understanding the possible levels of involvement for supporting organizations is important during the planning process. This includes clarifying whether costs will be split and what is required for an organization to have its name on signage.
  • Even in-kind support from organizations and the meeting host is a valuable contribution.
  • Exploring whether the data help desk can be a funded service with dedicated paid experts versus relying solely on volunteers is a consideration for long-term sustainability.