Joel Goodin Meagan Arrastia Erik Rawls Creating an organized research team through the use of online technology

TLC: Our ongoing success story The Learning Curve serves as our model for this presentation. Founded in 2010 Over 40 members, including graduate and undergraduate students from different backgrounds. Accomplishments: Conference proposals, articles/book chapters published

Benefits Why create an organized research team? Increases in: Productivity Opportunities Research Quality

Opportunities Build knowledge/experience Professional Advancement Networking Publication

Our story: Getting started Organizing our research team happened through the use of technology, most of it online. Dropbox® Google Voice/Wave ® Google Docs ® Zotero ®

“Basic” communication Our team still uses conventional means of communication. In fact, they are a vital vehicle for us. Phone Text Gchat/Gtalk Skype

Storage and sharing Dropbox allows users to sync files in folders across multiple computers. We initially considered this program. Good for transferring files Does not allow user permissions, but Google Docs does

Snapshot: Google Docs Free File storage/sharing Work together

Citation Management Our team marshals evidence on a grand scale. We wanted a place to store the various citations pivotal to our research. Zotero vs. EndNote vs. RefWorks Winner = Zotero! Zotero is free and user-friendly

Other Temporary Solutions Google Voice enhances users’ phone capabilities. Google Wave provides an online space for multiple users to collaborate in real time. Neither are consistently used.

Determining Needs: Summary Citation Management - Zotero Collaboration with Permissions - GDocs Audience Analysis – Gdocs Distance Meetings – Gdocs Storage, Sharing, and Organization – Gdocs

Planning Before you can begin collaborating on research at a large scale and across great distances, what will you need? Technology: organization, communication, collaboration Motivated members: students or teachers Effective/efficient leader(s) Clear and simple goals

Building Community Getting to know colleagues Formally (e.g., research interests, vitae) Casually (personal interests Collaboration/reciprocity

Simplifying Goals Patience with Emergence Slow Growth for the Long-term Key Players and Fluctuation Hierarchy vs. Team Unnecessary Tech Focus on the Needs at Hand

Leadership: Activating team members A view towards: Dynamic interplay of skills Sharing responsibilities: team leaders Efficiency Responsibility Communication

Sharing responsibilities: Team leaders Leaders help distribute the weight of responsibilities among group members. Information Team Research Team Technology Team Editing/Literature Team Community Team