A National Portal for Canadian Theses Sharon Reeves Manager, Theses Canada Presented at ETD 2003, Berlin Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Presentation Overview History of Theses Canada Mission Requirements – National E-Theses Program Portal – Phase One Phase One Challenges Portal – Phase Two Phase Two Challenges Digital Preservation Theses Canada Thèses Canada

History Canadian Theses Service created in 1965 Name changed to Theses Canada April 1, 2003 Theses Canada Thèses Canada

History (continued) Original purpose – to microfilm theses and make them more widely available Reproduction and sales contracted out to UMI Dissertations Publishing since 1997 Voluntary program – currently 55 universities participate 225,000+ theses in LAC collection Theses Canada Thèses Canada

History Titles listed in Canadiana, Canada’s national bibliography Catalogue records freely available in AMICUS Web: Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Theses Canada Mission to acquire, preserve and provide access to a comprehensive collection of Canadian theses to disseminate theses by inter-library loan and sale Theses Canada Thèses Canada

New role – E-theses Support Canadian graduate schools during the transition from print to e-theses Acquisition and preservation of freely accessible collection of Canadian e-theses at LAC Development of capacity for universities to submit e-theses to LAC Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Requirements – National E-theses Program Comprehensive national coverage Theses digital for entire life cycle; digital version preserved Stored in stable digital format, full text searchable Minimal number of conversions ETD metadata standard used; students supply basic metadata Free access from single access point No redundancy in workflow Theses Canada Thèses Canada

A National Portal for Canadian Theses Portal designed to function as a comprehensive repository of freely available full text Canadian theses and dissertations Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Portal – Phase 1 Initial content on portal includes: Approximately 45,000 full text electronic theses in PDF image format Theses processed from 1998 – Aug Catalogue records for all theses in LAC collection (with abstracts when available) Information about Theses Canada Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Phase One - Challenges Securing the funding for the project Technical challenges – getting the e-theses from UMI Coordinating the workflow between Theses Canada, DLCTF and ITSB Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Portal – Phase 2 Will allow Canadian universities to submit e- theses and metadata directly to LAC Analysis of current workflow resulted in identification of basic operational workflow E-theses will be sent to LAC via FTP, initially in PDF text, later in XML Theses Canada will harvest metadata from universities Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Portal – Phase 2 (continued) Metadata at LAC will be available for harvesting by other organizations, e.g. NDLTD Standard student submission template under development ETD-ms to MARC format crosswalk Pilot project planned for late 2003 Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Phase Two Challenges Coordination with many universities at different stages in the transition from print to e-theses Dealing with two parallel systems during the transition Making changes to internal workflow for theses at LAC Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Digital Preservation Needs to be resolved not just for e-theses but for all e-publications Canadian universities reluctant to give up preservation quality microfiche Theses Canada will continue reproduction service for the foreseeable future Theses Canada Thèses Canada

Mot final Theses Canada will continue to provide leadership to meet the goal of acquiring, preserving and providing access to a comprehensive collection of Canadian theses and dissertations in electronic or microfiche formats Theses Canada Thèses Canada