University of Maryland and Dartmouth College to Host Crowdsourcing Workshop

The NEH has announced the award of a Cooperative Agreement to Dartmouth College and University of Maryland for a May 2015 event entitled 'Engaging the Public: Best Practices for Crowdsourcing Across the Disciplines.'" The workshop will investigate how crowdsourcing works as an effective means for generating knowledge and connecting the public with cultural heritage resources.

From the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities:

“The NEH has announced the award of a Cooperative Agreement to Dartmouth College and University of Maryland for a May 2015 event entitled ‘Engaging the Public: Best Practices for Crowdsourcing Across the Disciplines.'” The workshop will investigate how crowdsourcing works as an effective means for generating knowledge and connecting the public with cultural heritage resources. During the workshop, groups will discuss crowdsourcing strategies, how to implement crowdsourcing into institutional operations, how to develop programs across disciplines, and increasing knowledge of your project to the public.

The workshop planned for May 6-8, 2015, at the University of Maryland will expand upon Dartmouth’s Institute for Museum and Library Services 2014 crowdsourcing event, the National Forum in Crowdsourcing for Libraries and Archives: Creating a Crowdsourcing Consortium (CCLA). The CCLA brought together 50 scholars from various humanities disciplines for a two and a half day event. Mary Flanagan from Drtmouth ran the CCLA and will be the lead operator of the “Engaging the Public: Best Practices for Crowdsourcing Across the Disciplines.” Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities director Neil Fraistat and Assistant Professor in the University of Maryland iSchool will also be co-instructing the event.

“The ultimate goal of the event is to assemble collective knowledge about the potential for crowdsourcing infrastructures, content and tools, in order to build an important intellectual and networking bridge for crowdsourced research projects and advance a national and cross-disciplinary agenda.”

Registration information, including cost and final location, have not yet been announced. More information about the event can be found at the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities blog.