On the tenth anniversary of the internationally celebrated Love Data Week, institutions, organizations, researchers, students, and data enthusiasts are rising to the theme of “Where’s the Data?” This is an increasingly important topic as funders and publishers have established firm expectations of data sharing, which requires careful storage and management of data throughout the life of a project, as well as sharing it in appropriate settings such as an array of online repositories. Being able to locate and safely store data at every step is key for responsible management of research data and to increase data usefulness into the future.

When thinking about data storage at Northwestern, we recommend starting from the local, and taking it to the national or global levels: 

• First, set up a well-managed and understandable local folder structure to hold your project’s important documents and data. Unsure where to start? Take our brand-new Galter Library class, Digital Folder Organization: Best Practices and Strategies, on Wednesday, February 11 at 11:00am CT to get pointed in the right direction! 
• Will your project require use of Quest, a secure data enclave, or other university resources for data processing and storage? Are you still weighing up the tools and options? For help, consult the Document Sharing and Data Storage Finder hosted on NU IT’s website. Some of the resources may involve a cost, so be sure to use the tool to identify storage solutions early in the project. 
• To help answer the research community’s questions around data management and broader data sharing, NU IT, Research Computing and Data Services, and Galter Library have collaborated to host the Research Data Management and Sharing clearinghouse website. This site explains the steps, guidelines, and resources available to Northwestern researchers who must share data for compliance with publisher and funder data sharing mandates. This includes information on data security levels for sharing, as well as repository options for data sharing.  
• Generalist (non-discipline-specific) repositories are an option for sharing non-sensitive, non-identifiable data. Explore the options offered by the seven repositories participating in the Generalist Repository Ecosystem Initiative if you need to share data for compliance. 

Galter librarians are always available to help with questions about storing and sharing data! Contact us at the Galter DataLab, or reach out at researchdata@northwestern.edu. 

Want to be more involved in Love Data Week? Learn about all this year’s events, and see recordings from Love Data Week 2025 events at Northwestern.