Skip To Main ContentUniversity of Oregon
University of Oregon Libraries
University of Oregon Libraries

Metadata Services and Digital Projects


What We Do


Metadata Services and Digital Projects serves the University of Oregon's faculty, students and staff by providing intellectual, physical, and virtual access to the University of Oregon Libraries' collections in all formats and by ensuring the long-term usability of those collections. It further serves the UO community by coordinating campus efforts to create and maintain an archive of campus scholarly output and by assisting faculty and students with the presentation of or development of content management systems for their own collections of materials.

  • We evaluate metadata standards and schemas to determine the most effective means for facilitating resource discovery and retrieval.
  • We coordinate digital library efforts for the University of Oregon Libraries, reviewing standards, setting local policies, utilizing digital content management systems, and liaising with collection curators and others in the Libraries, on campus, and with external groups and agencies.
  • We analyze the content of and describe the Libraries' books, journals, videos, music materials, maps, electronic resources, and digital collections and apply the appropriate descriptions, subject terms and classification to records for the resources.
  • We create and maintain the Libraries' online public access catalog by adding and updating MARC bibliographic records and holdings information for the Libraries' collections.
  • We create and maintain the Libraries' digital collections via the CONTENTdm system
  • We share our expertise in metadata and the organization of materials with faculty and other campus groups and assist them in the development of systems for describing and providing access to their collections and research.
  • We ensure the quality of the data in the public access catalog and the digital content management systems operated by the Libraries, performing authority control, building appropriate user reference structures, and carrying out systematic database clean-up.
  • We work with our colleagues in the Libraries and the Orbis Cascade Alliance to create and maintain the underlying system to support the public access catalog.
  • We perform retrospective conversion for the Libraries' older materials so that they are also represented in the online catalog.
  • We accurately label all physical library materials so they can be shelved and retrieved.
  • We evaluate all library materials for appropriate preservation and conservation treatment, performing reformatting, repair, and reinforcement as needed.
  • We review preservation standards and techniques, establish local best practices, and coordinate policy setting to ensure the long-term usability of the Libraries' physical and virtual collections.
  • We serve on the Libraries' Disaster Response Team, setting policies, developing local best practices, and carrying out clean-up and recovery following disasters.
  • We coordinate policy-setting for and maintain the UO's pilot institutional repository, Scholars' Bank and assist faculty and students with the use of the system.
  • We create archival copies of documents and legal records on 35mm and 16mm microfilm.
  • We provide outreach assistance by designing and producing research posters, slides, transparencies, exhibit labels and signs.
  • We produce high-quality digital and traditional darkroom prints from the University Libraries' Special Collections and University Archives photo collections.

Members of Metadata Services and Digital Projects are active in a wide range of professional organizations relating to their specific areas of expertise. In addition, the department participates fully in all four components of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC), an international organization based at the Library of Congress that is dedicated to the expansion of cooperative cataloging and resource sharing for increased bibliographic control of the world's intellectual content. We also participate in the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI), an international effort to develop standards to facilitate cross-community sharing of digital content.


Team Structure



Maintained by: MSDP,msdpweb@uoregon.edu
Last Modified: 06/25/2008