As culminating research projects in graduate education evolve to reflect new standards and technologies, many universities are reviewing their workflows for submission and review of theses and dissertations as well as accompanying materials, and they are finding options that did not exist when they established their current ETD processes.
Vireo, the open source ETD system developed with the support of an IMLS grant, by the Texas Digital Library has become a popular alternative to proprietary systems. It offers higher education institutions a highly customizable and flexible platform for managing all of the work related to ingesting, reviewing, approving and ultimately depositing works into the institutional repository and if desired to PQDT Global. Many top universities have adopted this solution, including the University of Texas, Texas A&M, Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Illinois and Harvard University.
Beginning in 2019, BiblioLabs will be offering Vireo hosting and consulting services for libraries that would like to take advantage of the system’s unique features and would prefer to engage a third party to implement and/or host the system. Vireo saves time and duplication of efforts for librarians, students, graduate schools, and IR managers. It offers highly customizable data collection fields, and it can be customized at the individual department level. Seamless integration with institutional repositories, campus-wide student information software, and metadata enhancement tools can streamline previously cumbersome workflows.
For students the advantages are clear:
- Submit once and done
- No pre-registration required–integrates with single sign-on systems
- Customized data collection fields eliminate workarounds and minimize confusion
- No separate deposit into the institutional repository
- No separate deposit to ProQuest
- No requirement to enter a distribution agreement with a commercial entity
- Optional integration of print-on-demand publication services
Institutions can enlist BiblioLabs to host Vireo for a low annual subscription fee or take advantage of BiblioLabs’ complimentary hosting services. Request more information today.