Five Things To Know About ICPSR Data Rescue Efforts
ANN ARBOR–As vital data faces the threat of disappearance, the research data community has turned to the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) and other data stewards for action. ICPSR, with its network of over 800 institutions, exemplifies this effort through its DataLumos initiative, which has tripled its dataset holdings via proactive rescue efforts. The consortium is actively crowdsourcing input to identify at-risk data and seeking volunteers to organize extensive archives. This collaboration underscores ICPSR's crucial role in preserving data essential for social science research. Here are five things to know about ICPSR’s part in renewed data preservation efforts.
1. ICPSR is a longtime data steward. Rescuing data is par for the course.
Since 1962, ICPSR has provided data, tools, and other resources used by countless researchers to better understand the ever-changing social environment. Thousands of students have been trained in fundamental and cutting-edge methodological and analytic techniques as part of the Summer Program in Quantitative Methods (stats “summer camp”). With tens of thousands of studies spanning health, education, crime and delinquency, demography, race and ethnicity, public policy, and more, “ICPSR” is synonymous with “data.”
2. 800+ ICPSR member institutions support our data preservation and distribution efforts.
ICPSR is an international consortium of more than 800 institutions. Membership in ICPSR includes access to: 21K+ studies, 6.7M variables, and 117.8K publications in the ICPSR Bibliography of data-related literature. These resources are invaluable for advancing research and education across a range of disciplines, including political science, sociology, economics, and public health. By joining ICPSR, institutions can conduct groundbreaking research, replicate studies, and enhance data analysis in teaching. The consortium also offers expert training through workshops and webinars to improve data management and analysis skills. Moreover, being part of this extensive network fosters collaboration and networking opportunities among member institutions, enhancing the collective capability to advance social science research and education globally.
3. 225 datasets have been rescued and archived at DataLumos since Jan. 1, 2025.
DataLumos, established in 2017, is an ICPSR archive for valuable government data resources. DataLumos held 103 datasets before January 1, 2025. Recent rescue efforts in the research data community have more than tripled the volume of DataLumos’s holdings. In addition to what has already been archived at DataLumos, ICPSR has collected more than 350 datasets that have not yet been archived. Staff and volunteers are currently working to organize and supply metadata for these files so they can be archived for long term preservation and access.
4. Where things stand today.
Valuable federal data is continuing to disappear. ICPSR is actively seeking suggestions/nominations for at-risk data sources that need to be rescued. We have recently launched a new process to organize and ingest study-level metadata for files that haven’t yet been archived and are seeking volunteers to assist with this effort.
5. You can help.
- Support Critical Government Data Preservation
- Explore or contribute to DataLumos
- Use this form to nominate at-risk data that should be downloaded and archived by ICPSR, or to let us know about data resources you’ve already downloaded and would like to share.
- Volunteer to support our efforts by emailing icpsr-data-rescue@umich.edu. In your message, please indicate whether you have experience with Python, experience working with metadata, and/or experience working with specific at-risk datasets.
Related:
- A Renewed Call for Preservation of At-Risk Government Data
- The Data Rescue Project
- Data Rescue in the Press
- Video: An ICPSR data rescue in progress - Endangered Data Week 2018
Mar 13, 2025