SPECIAL ISSUE: Metadata and Organizing Educational Resources on the Internet
editor: Jane Greenberg
A
Special Editorial Note
The tremendous growth of the Internet, particularly
the World Wide Web, has had a remarkable impact on availability of educational
resources in K-12, secondary, adult, and other distinct educational
communities. Digital objects in a
variety of formats (e.g., text, image, audio, moving image, and multi-media
creations), fully developed lesson plans, and curriculum standards
documentation are examples of the types of resources that are increasingly
being accessed through online public access catalogs (OPACs) and educationally
focused digital libraries. The
development of interactive lesson plans and distance education initiatives,
both of which rely heavily on access to Internet resources, are also becoming
more commonplace. Underlying the
success of this evolving educational environment is the development and
deployment of metadata standards that support the discovery, use, and integrity
of Internet resources.
This special volume of the Journal of Internet Cataloging (JIC,
vol. 3, parts 1 and 2/3) documents the experiences of metadata creators (both
catalogers and indexers), library administrators, and educators who are
actively engaged in projects that organize Internet resources for educational
purposes. While there are many educational
projects that involve metadata, this is the first time that a series of
articles specifically addressing this topic have been brought together in a
single work.
The articles in this volume document the
experiences of metadata creators (catalogers and indexers), library
administrators, and educators who are actively engaged in projects that
organize Internet resources for educational purposes. The volume is divided into two sections: Part1
examines the status quo of cataloging Internet resources and explores the
relationship between traditional cataloging practices and Internet cataloging; Part 2/3(combined) introduces three metadata schemes, presents a sample
of Internet-based educational projects in which metadata plays a central role,
and examines best practices and theoretical aspects of metadata in relation to
the evolving Internet-based educational terrain. A synopsis of both part 1
and part 2/3 is presented below to
provide readers with an overview of this entire JIC volume (vol. 3), which will also be published as a Haworth
monograph.
This part opens with and introductory piece by
the editor, which defines the Internet-based educational terrain and exams
metadata questions. This article is
followed by Karen Letarte's report on a survey study that examines how
school library media centers are providing access to range of electronic
resources (educational software, interactive multimedia, and Internet
resources). Letarte's article is followed Ursula
Giere and Eva Kupidura's report on a world-wide survey that examined networking issues and traditional and
electronic resources cataloging for the ALADIN (Adult Learning Documentation and Information
Network) project. Next are three
articles that examine the integration of traditional and Internet cataloging
practices. Karen
Plummer presents a non-traditional approach to cataloging K-12 math and science
curriculum resources via the Eisenhower National Clearinghouse for
Mathematics and Science Education (ENC) project. Cheryl
Martin and Wayne Daniels illustrates
the use of Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) for ordering K-12 science
curriculum resources in Science Net, which is for Canadian schools. Their article also explores the use of the
Dublin Core for both ScienceNet and the Virtual Reference Library project. And D.
Grant Campbell presents a theoretical analysis the concept document extent via a series of genres and the evolving notion of edition statement. The first part of this JIC volume concludes with an article by James
Briggs Murray on the democratization
of education and the role of the Schomburg Center's library catalog. The article documents the Center's catalog
from its beginnings up to present day and highlights current metadata within
the context of the Digital Schomburg project.
Part 2/3 begins by highlighting three metadata schemes for educational resources. Carrie Lowe's article introduces the Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM) project and development of the GEM metadata profile, which is among one of the most popular metadata educationally focused metadata schemes. Lowe’s article covers two case studies that apply the GEM metadata profile. An article documenting the development and implementation of the PEN-DOR metadata scheme follows next. The PEN-DOR scheme is based on input from project team members as well as an advisory board composed of educators and school media specialists. The ARIADNE metadata system, which is based on the Learning Object Model (LOM) scheme developed by IEEE, is third scheme highlighted in this group of articles. The use of this scheme is meant to support the sharing and reuse of digital pedagogical materials on a European-wide basis.
The increased use of Internet-based technology for educational purposes has given rise to a wide variety of projects in which metadata creation and development has played a central role. The following group of articles is a sample of some of these projects. Amy Smith's article documents the evolution of a Greek sculpture catalog that is part of the Perseus Project. Categorization of artworks and multi-relational database issues are discussed along with and the potential to eventually reconstruct lost original art works during the next phase of catalog development. Next, Brad Eden shares his cataloging and telecommuting experiences with the Synthesis Coalition's National Engineering Education Delivery System (NEEDS) project. Eden discusses the use of library standards to for cataloging engineering computer courseware modules, and comments on the future of telecommuting and remote cataloging of digital resources. Cate Richmond and Ebe Kartus examine how metadata can be retrospectively incorporated into new print and electronic course material, and outlines a series of issues that any Library needs to consider the university supports access to course materials in this venue. And Ana Torres and Cynthia Wolff share their experience in providing access to Internet-based and other electronic course material via the OPAC at the Bern Dibner Library of Science and Technology at Polytechnic University. The final article in this section is on the RePEc project, which is a distributed catalog of economics papers primarily for academic community education and research. Cruz and Krichel evaluate the success in providing metadata of reasonable quality through a decentralized approach.
The last section of this part, and the volume in total, examines best practices and theoretical aspects of metadata in relation to the evolving Internet-based educational terrain. Richard Giordano emphasizes contextual aspects of metadata for describing documents and their relationship to educational practice. Giordano also discusses document architecture and the Dublin Core and GEM metadata schemes. Thomas Wason and David Wiley present concepts of a metadata space in relation to cataloging and discovery. The scope of the concepts encompasses both educational related and general metadata systems. The last article in this special volume is by William H. Graves, who among many outstanding achievements in the area of educational technology is Chairman and Founder of eduprise.com, on EDUCAUSE’s Board of Directors, and on the steering committees for the Instructional Management Systems (IMS) Cooperative and the ARL/EDUCAUSE Coalition for Networked Information. Graves shares his vision of the strategic impact of the Internet on education. In doing so he highlights the importance of metadata for resource discovery as the central topic of this special volume of the Journal of Internet Cataloging.