CESSDA (the Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives) will celebrate its 50th Anniversary this year with a conference in Bergen, Norway, between 15 June – 18 June.
The conference will mark the organisation’s five decades of collaboration, innovation, and service to the European social science research community.
It will also bring together its Service Providers and partners, as well as researchers, open science, data experts, policy actors and funding partners. Additionally, networks from across Europe and beyond will meet to reflect on CESSDA’s legacy and chart a shared vision for the future.
The four-day conference programme is anchored in CESSDA’s strategic pillars (2023–2027) of Data, People, and Landscape. The conference is an opportunity for scientific and policy voices to ask bold questions, strengthen synergies, and set the course for a future-ready European Research Area.
Experts from the UK Data Service will also speak at the event, including Darren Bell, the Director of Technical Services at the UK Data Service.
His first presentation will be focus on the importance of interoperability:
Workshop 1: Interoperability Ecosystem – Back To Basics – on 15 June, between 9am-10am CET.
Here is a summary of the areas his workshop will cover:
Within the European Research Area (ERA), CESSDA, EOSC, DDI, and W3C standards are interlinked and play an important role in data repositories. This workshop uses plain, non-technical language to provide answers to the following questions:
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How does CESSDA, EOSC, SSHOC, and the DDI Alliance fit together in the ERA?
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What do the words “interoperability” and “federation” mean for data repositories of different sizes, plus. why it matters for researchers and Service Providers?
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How do core tools and standards (e.g., CDC, ELSST, Dataverse, Colectica, RDF, Croissant, DCAT, etc.) interact to support research infrastructures.
Darren Bell will also present other important presentations at the conference.
Hervé L’Hours, the Associate Director for Repository & Data Infrastructure Services Harmonisation at the UK Data Service, will co-present Workshop 2: Trust & Landscape – CoreTrustSeal Support: CESSDA Common Evidence – on 15 June, between 10.30am and 12pm CET.
He will talk alongside:
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Maria Kleemola, the Development Manager for FSD Finland.
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Maaike Verburg, a Research Data Management Specialist for DANS (Data Archiving and Networked Services), based in the Netherlands.
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Ami Saji, the Data documentation and distribution specialist from Progedo (commissioned by The French National Centre for Scientific Research – CNRS) in France.
Here is a summary of the areas the presentation will cover:
CESSDA’s common resources (e.g., guidance, standards, policies) can help illustrate commitments to community principles (e.g., FAIR, TRUST, and CARE) more coherently. These common resources can be used as evidence when applying CoreTrustSeal Certification. This workshop provides answers to these questions:
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What are the lessons learned from applying for CoreTrustSeal?
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How can CESSDA Common Evidence support CoreTrustSeal applications?
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How can the FIDELIS Transparent Trustworthy Repository Attributes Matrix (TTRAM) be used to support the certification process?
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How can the CESSDA CoreTrustSeal support be improved?
At the conference, the CESSDA team is also keen to discuss how digital transformation, open science, and artificial intelligence are shaping how research is carried out and its connection with society.
From climate change, inequality, to disinformation – as social challenges grow more urgent and complex, the CESSDA team says the need for trustworthy, interoperable, and policy-relevant social science data has never been greater.
In this evolving landscape, the CESSDA team believes that social science data archives play a critical role in maximising the benefits of research data while mitigating potential risks, under the principle of “as open as possible and as closed as necessary”.
The conference will also celebrate the organisation’s impact on open science and open data in the European Research Area and beyond.
Additionally, it will brings together partner organisations, and international networks to share knowledge, showcase achievements, and address the evolving landscape of research and innovation.