Take us not for granted: Protecting community interests through governance

Jennifer Gibson

Funding Area: Community governance / Gobernanza comunitaria

Problem Statement: As a non-profit organization established by the research community 15 years ago, Dryad has operated in the community interest and with shared values. Our software is open-source, the data we publish is openly available, and we value responsibility, inclusion, openness, and trustworthiness. Our community has grown, in particular among academic and research institutions that support Dryad as an independent, community-owned resource, but there are no formal, legal channels to ensure that all our members are appropriately represented in Dryad and given the chance to express their views. We do what we can, but community ownership of Dryad must be secured through the formal instruments that govern us: our by-laws, articles of incorporation and policies. As a resource-limited organization, we have not been able to update these since 2016 or earlier.

Proposed Activities: In the coming year, and before the end of June 2024 (our fiscal year), we would very much like to solicit input from our community on approaches to governance, via surveys, listening sessions and a larger community meeting. We will use their feedback to inform a revision to the by-laws, articles of incorporation and devise a policy for Board elections. We would need the support of a specialist non-profit administrator, community engagement lead and an attorney to complete this work.

Openness: We will consult our entire membership on their attitudes toward Dryad and opportunities to engage and be represented. We will solicit feedback on our proposed approach to governance from the members (and potentially the wider community, as we have here: https://blog.datadryad.org/2023/07/24/invitation-to-comment-dryads-revised-membership-model-for-academic-and-research-institutions/). Revisions to our bylaws will be shared openly before they are finalized and, again, published openly (as here: https://datadryad.org/docs/DryadBylaws.pdf). We would be happy to also write and publish an open report on our learnings if that would be of interest.

Challenges: It is sometimes challenging to get time and attention from busy volunteer Board members. It is also difficult to solicit attentive replies from our busy members – all of whom care a great deal but are otherwise preoccupied. We will also need to find legal support that is knowledgeable in our area and willing to help encode the spirit and values of the organization.

Neglectedness: I’m not aware of other sources of funding for this.

Success: This work will be successful if it attracts strong engagement from our community in the feedback process and if it helps us to codify community representation in our systems of governance that is clearly explained, simple to maintain, inclusive, equitable, transparent, and fair.

Total Budget: $20,152

Affiliations: Dryad

LMIE Carveout: We do not

Team Skills: The Dryad team’s experience in the open works community is a driving force of the spirit and commitment with which we assert ourselves to the sustainability and values of the organization. We have included brief bios for key personnel here. Sarah and Mark both serve as part-time consultants to Dryad and are ideally suited and poised to complete this work. Sarah is a librarian and library consultant with a decade of experience supporting open access, digital scholarship, and scholarly communications through strategic planning, research, service design, facilitation, and communications work. As Head of Community Engagement at Dryad, Sarah works with institutions, funders, and researchers to increase awareness of and engagement with data sharing and data reuse. Mark has worked in academic publishing for over 20 years, with experience ranging from editorial management to strategic development, in academic, nonprofit, and commercial settings. He has held positions at the Archaeological Institute of America, SAGE, and BioOne, where he was Senior Director for Strategic Development. Long active in the development of open-access models, he believes that sustainable models are essential to meaningful innovation in scholarly communications.

Submission Number: 61