Illinois Data Bank

You are ready to deposit data if:

  • your data is in a final state and not expected to undergo revisions.
  • you have removed any private, confidential, or other legally protected information from your data.
  • you are a faculty member, staff member, or graduate student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
  • you have permission to publicly distribute data from all creator(s) and/or copyright owner(s).

Published data:

  • is open to anyone in the world.
  • receives a stable identifier (DOI) for easy reference and citation.
  • is readily available for anyone to access for a minimum of 5 years.
  • is located in a stable environment that complies with many funder and publisher requirements.

Statement of Commitment

The Illinois Data Bank's mission is to centralize, preserve, and provide persistent and reliable access to the research data created by affiliates of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, such as its faculty, academic staff, and graduate students. The Research Data Service at the University Library maintains and operates the Illinois Data Bank on behalf of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus. The University Library has a long history of successfully supporting the preservation of and access to Illinois research outputs. The Illinois Data Bank operates within a robust policy framework that fully describes the University's commitment to providing persistent and reliable access to research data.

Researcher Spotlight

featured researcher photo
Spencer D. C. Keralis Dr. Keralis is Assistant Professor and Digital Humanities Librarian. Their research crosses disciplinary boundaries to examine labor ethics and applied social justice principles in digital scholarship and librarianship. They were principal investigator for the TX-Gender Project, and the Becoming a Trans Inclusive Library Project, which explored the professional development needs of librarians to deliver inclusive services for transgender and gender creative patrons.
What influenced your decision to deposit your data in the Illinois Data Bank and what do you see as the primary benefit to you of archiving your data in a repository?
Sharing data is a critical part of my research process. Making survey data available helps others verify my results, which increases my credibility. It also allows others to use and cite my data to draw their own interpretations and to complement their own research. This is particularly important for research areas in which there isn’t a lot of data available. Archiving my data also gives me peace of mind that the data will not be lost due to equipment failures or misplacing a thumb drive. I know I can access my data in the future because it’s safe in the Illinois Data Bank.

I’m a firm believer in Open Access and Open Data, so I always make a point of making sure my data, survey instruments, and publications are in a repository. The Illinois Data Bank is a safe, sustainable, and secure place to share my data, and has a great reputation on campus and beyond. The level of collaborative service and professionalism of the Illinois Data Bank staff makes me feel confident that my data will be well cared for and available to cite, share, and reuse in the future.

I’d urge other scholars to explore ways to make their data and other research outputs open. It’s a great way to increase awareness of your work, and is much safer than ad hoc data storage, and more affordable than commercial solutions. I kind of feel like an ad for Illinois Data Bank, but I really do believe they’re among the best in the academic data repository business, and there’s nobody I’d rather trust with my data!

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