Reflections on Data Stewardship: Farewell to CDL

After three years at my role at the UC3, earlier this year, I left to return to the Scripps Institution of Oceanography as a Visiting Scholar, where I am now focusing on projects focused on climate data preservation. While the move represents a return to my institutional home of more than three decades, my time at CDL and UCOP profoundly shaped how I think about the future of data stewardship and the infrastructure needed to support it. 

Bringing research data infrastructure

Before joining UC3, I spent over 30 years at Scripps working in ocean and climate data stewardship. Climate science has long excelled at producing observations that are essential to understanding our planet. But one of the lessons that became clearer during my time at UC3 is that the infrastructure that ensures those data remain accessible, reusable, and preserved over time is just as important.

At UC3, I had the opportunity to work alongside colleagues building exactly that kind of infrastructure. As Senior Product Manager for Data Publishing and Research Data Specialist, I worked across projects focused on data publishing, repository ecosystems, and strengthening community skills in data stewardship.

Whether through collaborations around generalist repositories, work connected to the NIH Generalist Repository Ecosystem Initiative (GREI), or training initiatives such as the RDA School for Research Data Science, or the IMLS-funded Carpentries 2.0 project, I saw firsthand how UC3 approaches research data as an ecosystem. The experience reinforced a simple but powerful insight: data that are truly FAIR rarely need rescuing.

The growing urgency of climate data preservation

That insight has become increasingly important as climate researchers confront the challenge of preserving and mobilizing critical environmental data. During my time at CDL, I helped co-found the Climate/Ocean Data Action Network (CO-DAN), a grassroots coalition of data professionals, scientists, librarians, and technologists working together to coordinate climate data preservation efforts. What began as emergency “data rescue” work quickly revealed deeper structural challenges in how climate data are managed and preserved.

The work happening at UC3 helped illuminate what a more sustainable approach could look like. Professional data stewardship infrastructure, the kind UC3 exemplifies, provides the standards, tools, and community coordination needed to ensure that important data remain available for future research.

Returning to Scripps with new tools and perspectives

Now back at Scripps as a Visiting Scholar, I am working with the Sandin Lab and the Scripps Polar Center on data related to ice sheet and ocean interactions, while continuing to collaborate with colleagues across the climate and data stewardship communities.

My time at UC3 provided something that climate science urgently needs: deeper exposure to the professional infrastructure that supports long-term data stewardship. That perspective is now informing the work I’m doing at Scripps and in the broader climate data community. In addition to my work at Scripps, I continue to contribute to several organizations focused on climate data, research infrastructure, and equity in science, including the New York Climate Exchange, the Keeling Curve Foundation, the Southern Ocean Observing System, Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP), Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), and the American Geophysical Union.

Gratitude

Looking back, my time at UCOP and CDL was invaluable. The colleagues I worked with, the UC-wide perspective I gained, and the professional infrastructure expertise I built have prepared me for what comes next in ways I couldn’t have anticipated. I look forward to continued collaboration with UC colleagues as we work together to build more resilient data infrastructure. In many ways, this transition feels less like a goodbye and more like a continuation of a conversation. Although I’ve returned to Scripps, I don’t see this as the end of my connection to CDL and UCOP. Many of the challenges facing climate science and research data infrastructure are shared challenges, and I know our paths will continue to cross.