Service Science & Surveys: Value Adding Connections Between Electronic Theses and Dissertations, Alumni, and the Library

In 2017, the authors embarked upon a project to compare their institutional transitions from print to electronic theses and dissertations (ETD). The two universities on opposite coasts – Florida and California – are both private not-for-profit with doctoral programs. They are Nova Southeastern University and University of the Pacific. During their presentation - “ETDS On Opposite Coasts: Comparisons and Connections Between Two Private American Universities and the Transition from Print to Electronic Theses and Dissertations” - at the USetdA 2017 conference in Washington, D.C., the researchers shared results from an ETD administrator survey, an alumni survey, and statistics on their individual digitization projects. The alumni survey – conducted solely at Nova Southeastern University due to the longevity of their digitization process – was of primary interest in the outcomes. How can the digitization of a print theses/dissertation affect the alumni author? How does it better or prove detrimental to job or academic goals? How can it influence the research of others? The questions coalesced to form the topic of this updated presentation on co-creating value in theses and dissertation digitization. The academic library offers an essential service in digitizing, creating metadata, uploading, and preserving a digital copy of the alumni’s work. The author has created value in writing the original work and provides additional value in sharing out the work amongst their peers (e.g. social media, academic networks like ResearchGate or LinkedIn), as well as providing permission to make it open access. It is the hope at both institutions that the co-creation of value in this project will advance alumni relations with their alma mater and increase use and reuse of the research by additional parties, furthering the scholarly communication lifecycle and evolving disciplinary knowledge. The updated, 2021, presentation will include results from an alumni survey conducted at the University of the Pacific, preliminary results from an abbreviated alumni survey conducted at Nova Southeastern University, as well as a brief history of the previous surveys, hopes for the future, and the authors’ theoretical grounding of this work in Service Science and the co-creation of value.