From ETDs to Institutional Repository: Opportunities and Problems at the University of the West Indies

From ETDs to Institutional Repository: Opportunities and Problems at the University of the West Indies

Swarna Bandara

University of the West Indies (UWI) is a multi Campus University that serves the English Speaking Caribbean and major campuses are situated in Jamaica (Mona), Barbados (Cave Hill) and Trinidad and Tobago (St. Augustine). Strategic plans of the UWI clearly specify the need to increase impact of its research and this presented an excellent opportunity for an ETD project in 2002 and to be a member of NDLTD. There was immediate response from Mona Campus and unanimously a decision was made to make the ETD Project a UWI wide initiative and very small team worked towards implementing the project. In 2004, Dspace was selected as the methodology with the hope that ETD initiative will pave the way for an Institutional Repository without having to go through the normal procedures for getting a project approved. A few academics with some knowledge on technology and graduate students were interested in the Project, but at the administrative level where decisions needed to made recognition and acceptance of the concept was slow and cautious. A number of introductory sessions on Open Access and ETD Project were offered to all three campuses, to further educate the community, using "bottom up" approach. Highlights of the progress include obtaining a server from Dell, a graduate student in Computer Science undertaking update Theses Alive Plug-in for Institutional Repositories (TAPIR) to prepare workspace for ETD submission to Dspace and also a commitment from Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences to make self archival of research mandatory. However, lack of knowledge on technology and current trends in research communication, fear of Open Access, copyright implications and personal differences hampered the ETD project to the extend that in 2008, no policy decisions were made regarding ETD submissions. The paper discusses what achievements were made and what progress could have been possible, implications of multi campus implementation of the Project, lessons learnt in the process and Institutional Repository on Dspace moving ahead while ETD Project is set in the back burner.

2008