Teaching and learning materials (Open Educational Resources, OER) aimed at developing data literacy and competencies in research data management (RDM) are a central focus within the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI) and beyond. Most RDM projects and networks either collect or produce OER, while addressing key questions regarding sustainability, aggregation, curation, and interlinking. The FAIR principles apply here in the same way as they do to research data.

In this context, representatives from the NFDI consortia NFDI4Culture, NFDI4Memory, the data competence centers QUADRIGA and HERMES, and the infrastructure project of the NFDI section "Training & Education" – DALIA – gathered at the Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz for a joint workshop on April 22–23, 2024. The projects presented their current progress, followed by interactive formats to explore collaboration opportunities, synergistic effects and key discussion points.

The NFDI consortium NFDI4Culture (project duration 2020–2025) introduced a service that provides a selection of OER tailored to the humanities and cultural sciences communities, encompassing both generic and discipline-specific offerings related to research data management and data competencies. Prior to this, the “Cultural Research Data Academy” team conducted surveys to assess the needs of the NFDI4Culture communities and compiled the results into a portfolio that was evaluated against selected quality criteria. This led to the creation of the “Educational Resource Finder” (ERF), a curated selection of training and continuing education offerings available in both German and English, aimed at individuals at all levels of expertise and updated on an ongoing basis.

The NFDI consortium NFDI4Memory (project duration 2023–2028) presented its work packages in the Task Area “Data Literacy” with a focus on OER. This Task Area aims to improve data competencies in research and teaching in historically oriented disciplines. Among other initiatives, a data literacy training catalog with didactic and content-related recommendations is being developed, along with target-group-specific training modules. The content for the training catalog will be gathered through independent research, self-developed materials and surveys conducted within the community. Subsequently, the information will be organized into an evolving workflow for online presentation and search.

The BMBF-funded Data Competence Center QUADRIGA (project duration 2023–2026) brings together four disciplines – Digital Humanities, Administrative Science, Computer Science, and Information Science – focusing on data types such as text, tables and moving images at the scientific hub of Berlin-Brandenburg. Based on case studies, the center develops interactive textbooks (Jupyter Notebooks) known as QUADRIGA Educational Resources (QER), which are modularly designed and allow learning outcome assessments. During the workshop, workflows, particularly the interplay with the QUADRIGA Space and the QUADRIGA Navigator, were presented by Zhenya Samoilova, Sonja Schimmler, and Bettina Buchholz. Sibylle Söring participated on behalf of the institutionalization subproject.

The Data Competence Center HERMES (Humanities Education in Research, Data, and Methods), also funded by the BMBF (project duration 2023–2026), aims to impart and further develop data competencies within the humanities and cultural sciences. Staff members from the HERMES formats “Open Educational Resources” and “HERMES Hub” were present at the workshop. Within HERMES, OER are both created and aggregated in a Resource Base. A metadata recommendation is being developed based on a project-wide foundational metadata schema. HERMES places particular emphasis on tagging resources with the TaDiRAH taxonomy to facilitate filtering by research method. Additionally, the HERMES team will provide advisory support to researchers in the design and implementation of OER materials.

The DALIA project is a BMBF-funded infrastructure initiative (duration 2022–2025) within the Training and Education (EduTrain) section of the National Research Data Infrastructure. The project's goal is to build a Knowledge Graph for data literacy and RDM competencies related to OER. This endeavor also aims to connect stakeholders in the field and assess their previous work and needs. The Knowledge Graph will serve as the foundation for a platform where users can discover OER and authors can catalog their materials.

Workshop Results

The workshop identified three key areas of action as central challenges for further harmonization of project workflows related to materials and repositories:

● Metadata and Interoperability

● Sustainability

● Cooperations

Metadata and Interoperability: To align Open Educational Resources (OER) with the FAIR principles, their descriptions (metadata) must adhere to standardized data and controlled vocabularies. While various metadata standards exist for OER, the main challenge lies in balancing these established standards with specific needs that arise from the unique capacities, technical conditions, and requirements of the respective communities. Synergies can be fostered through the planned joint development of an application profile, as well as the collaborative evaluation of the DALIA OER metadata foundational schema, known as the “DALIA Interchange Format” (DIF). Additional opportunities for cooperation include the creation of case studies, training sessions, and needs assessments, all aimed at enhancing the effectiveness and reach of OER initiatives.

Sustainability: The topic of sustainability for infrastructure offerings encompasses several levels. It is clear that a service cannot have long-term viability unless it is sustainably organized and consistently funded. In addition to operational models, the use of open data standards is necessary to reduce dependencies on proprietary formats and tools. However, workshop participants focused on a third aspect of sustainability: community acceptance and use of the offering. In order to secure fundings, it is essential to demonstrate the relevance of the service to the specific academic community. This relevance can be evidenced through access or download statistics, as well as through interactions with the service providers. How to attract and retain target audiences to use a particular OER platform remains an open question. While meeting the identified needs is crucial, these needs are not yet fully understood. It was noted that the needs of educators and their OER usage behaviors are particularly less known.

Cooperations: The third thematic cluster involved discussions on potential collaborations between the participants and projects involved in the workshop. In addition to the measures discussed regarding metadata and sustainability, such as use cases and comparisons of metadata schemas between projects, several follow-up meetings and a subsequent workshop were agreed for spring 2025. Whenever possible, the aim is to avoid duplication of effort while maintaining an exchange between the projects.

In summary, it is evident that there is significant overlap in the work programs of all workshop participants (NFDI consortia and data competence centers). The discourse facilitated by joint events not only fosters a more rewarding exchange, but also helps to identify and reduce duplication of effort. In addition, it became clear that almost all aspects – such as metadata, funding, and community acceptance – are closely interconnected and interdependent. Accordingly, a series of next steps have been planned, including further meetings to discuss metadata profiles and a subsequent workshop aimed at expanding the circle of RDM projects involved in the fields of humanities and social sciences.