Penn State Data Management Plan Tutorial

Tools and Other Resources for Data Management Planning

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In the years since the NSF and other funding agencies announced the DMP requirement, tools, and other resources have emerged that researchers may find helpful to consult as part of data management planning.

The Penn State University Libraries, in collaboration with the Strategic Interdisciplinary Research Office, have also developed guidance for Penn State researchers that integrates references to the University's research administration policies and guidelines: University Policy Manual and Scholarsphere.

Excerpt from Libraries' Data Management Toolkit, as described in text above
Above is an excerpt from the Libraries' Data Management Toolkit.

Information about additional tools, services, and resources for long-term management of data is available from the Libraries’ research guide on Data Repository Services and Tools.

Another valuable resource is the DMPTool, available online for any researcher to use. Penn State has an institutional login.

DMPTool website homepage
The DMPTool has guidance and templates from various funding agencies and foundations, to help researchers generate a DMP.
Credit: DMPTool

With the DMPTool, researchers complete a webform describing their data management plan, which the DMPTool then formats to the specifications required by the NSF or other major granting agency. The resulting plan, which should be proofed by others (such as the liaison librarian for your subject), will be ready to be submitted, along with the proposal, to the grant funding agency.

If you use the DMPTool to develop a DMP, then keep in mind that the DMP generated at the end might not be only two pages - it could exceed the page limit. This means you'll need to do extra work in making sure the content does not exceed two pages.