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ACU Research Data Management Toolkit

This toolkit will help you to determine your research data management needs and create a data management plan that documents how data will be managed during the research process and after the project is completed.

Data ownership and intellectual property

Ownership of research data is a complex issue that may involve the Principal Investigator, the sponsoring institution, the funding agency and any participating human subjects. Ownership and rights issues for research data should be clarified at the very beginning of a research project, as these issues will affect future storage, sharing or re-use of the data. 

ACU policies and laws relating to ownership of copyright and other intellectual property apply to data that is used and created as part of research at ACU. For further information refer to the ACU Intellectual Property Policy (Policy, 2008).

ACU Researchers: research data produced while employed by ACU is owned by the University.

ACU Students: research data produced while a student at ACU is owned by the student

If you will be using third party research data, you should consider copyright and intellectual property issues as part of your data management plan. Agreements with the data owners will have an impact on how data can be managed during your project and into the future.

ACU policies & procedures

Refer to relevant ACU policies for further information. The list includes, but it may not be limited to:

Data licensing

Defining permissions, terms and conditions for reuse of data is essential so that prospective re-users know exactly what they can, and can't do when reusing data. 

Creative Commons

Open data can be licensed using a Creative Commons license.

Supporting Information