Ia, the world's first Rainbow portal launched in September 2023, and a year on, we share the collaborative nature of the project between Rōpū kohinga and AUT.

Background

Auckland University of Technology (AUT) (external link)has the highest proportion of Rainbow students in universities across Aotearoa, New Zealand. Additionally, it has a wealth of Rainbow and LGBTQIA+ research spanning decades. While AUT as a university places strategic importance on having open access, that alone does not make research easy to find and share. That's why AUT wanted a portal to spotlight Rainbow research excellence(external link) and to invite people from inside and outside the AUT community to engage. The portal would provide an academic frame around pride, showcasing research about Rainbow people and by Rainbow people.

The Rainbow portal would be a world-first.

Opportunity

AUT and Rōpū kohinga at Catalyst had an existing partnership working on open source solutions, primarily with the Koha library management system. AUT approached Rōpū kohinga in 2023 with their requirements to build the Rainbow portal.

There was already a shared understanding that the project would be collaborative and open source software would be part of the solution.

The solution needed an online platform, providing access to a curated selection of AUT staff and student research (approved by the owner) by and about Rainbow communities.

The portal needed to be a proud repository of research that lifted up Rainbow research and academic excellence.

Solution

To fully understand the requirements, the project began with workshops and an open mind to the choice of open source technology. Rōpū kohinga and AUT considered the people who could benefit from access to the research, such as:

• Older people who may have more time for reading and the confidence to explore their identity in their later years.
• Young people completing a school project.
• People looking for ways Rainbow communities and research might reflect or support who they are becoming as a person.
• International students who may want to engage anonymously due to the laws for Rainbow communities in their country of origin.
• Researchers.

The future platform requirements

Once they understood who may need to access the information, AUT and Rōpū kohinga agreed the platform should be:

• mobile responsive
• accessible without login
• accessible for all levels of vision and of a style that is appealing to engage with
• bringing focus to the research and the researchers.

The requirement for research to be available without login aligns with AUT's Open Scholarship policy (2020)(external link) to make AUT research, specifically journal articles and published conference papers, open-by-default.

From a technical perspective, the platform needed to:

1. present a searchable collection of research that could take several forms like essays, art, and theses
2. and display information about each item and its creator.

The content would surface from the AUT research repository, DSpace(external link) and through an automated feed of information between the two systems via API. The platform would also include editable web pages where AUT could present supporting information about the initiative and the researchers.

After considering a few options, the chosen solution for this platform was to make the research available in an installation of VuFind(external link), an open source search platform, also called a discovery layer. Discovery layers such as VuFind specialise in harvesting metadata from multiple outside systems and displaying the linked resources accessibly in a central hub. Plus, the Library Digital Development Team was already familiar with VuFind, so they didn't need to learn a new platform.

Community-wide support and knowledge

Before beginning the VuFind implementation, Rōpū kohinga contacted Equinox Open Library Initiative for advice as they had recently developed a custom VuFind theme. Equinox shared helpful insights and recommendations that would ensure the solution is future-proofed and resilient through upstream changes.

The initial implementation would search for information from the AUT DSpace research repository (AUT staff and student research). To enable use of the platform for future collaborations beyond AUT research, it needed to be able to access information from various locations. Rōpū kohinga built this functionality using OAI-PMH - the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting.

Ia is an inclusive and genderless Māori pronoun that also means current or flow. The name and whakataukī(external link) were gifted to the collection by a Māori advisor and academic at the university.

The creation of Ia

Once Ia was gifted the name, Rōpū kohinga began work on the design for Ia, starting with a visual identity guide. Catalyst's UX Design team created a logo, colours, and visual motifs for Ia. The designer drew inspiration from the whakataukī whilst meeting WCAG accessibility standards and respecting the AUT style guide. The final design was chosen for how it fits with the whakataukī and views on scholarly excellence and pride.

In parallel with the visual work, the technical work was underway.

• Alex Buckley, Rōpū kohinga developer, led the project and integrated DSpace with VuFind to pull the research outputs and metadata into Ia.
• The AUT library staff, the Rainbow Initiative team, and the AUT library staff curated the first additions to Ia ~ the Rainbow Collection with approval from the authors.
• The instance of VuFind is hosted on Catalyst Cloud(external link) to enable hands-off maintenance for AUT and rapid delivery by Catalyst whilst ensuring data sovereignty.

Free and open access to Rainbow knowledge

Now, people can easily search and filter the results in Ia by facets such as author, supervisor, subjects, year of publication, and research institution. Ia enables Rainbow and queer research to be easily referenced, printed, and linked to. The content includes graphic novels, reviews, articles, films, exegeses, dissertations, and art.

• 109 post graduate theses and staff research papers featured
• 15 Queer staff research profiles that are being regularly added to
• Downloads from 30+ countries

"Ia~ happened because of dedication and need. A small team of talented people with a similar vision, rolled up their sleeves and brought a facility into being where no similar precedent existed. It could not have happened without the commitment, skills, and values of the team at Catalyst."

- Professor Welby Ings, Professor of Art and Design at Auckland University of Technology.

Professor Welby Ings, Professor of Art and Design at Auckland University of Technology, shares that

"The overlap of open source and open access values [with Rōpū kohinga at Catalyst], combined with our existing partnership with the AUT library team, enabled our work to progress at a pace and quality that would not have otherwise been possible."

Ia~ was launched on the 6 September 2023. Welby states that "One year later, the site now features 109 post-graduate theses and staff research papers. It also presents 15 Queer staff research profiles that are being regularly added to. To date research on the site has accrued considerable and growing item views and downloads. It is significant that although there has been considerable use of the portal across Aotearoa, there have also been downloads from more than 30 countries, including many where our people are still criminalised and our research is restricted.

Catalyst were incredibly proud to deliver the Ia platform. As of 2023, 1 in 20 identify as LGBTQIA+ in Aotearoa(external link). Knowing that Ia could have an impact for such a big and diverse community makes the project even more rewarding for Rōpū kohinga.

Alex Buckley, Rōpū kohinga says "it was a privilege to work with AUT to bring Ia into the world."

Thanks to the AUT Office of the Vice Chancellor and other donors for funding the delivery work for Ia and the AUT library digital development team for their delivery support. Next up, AUT is collaborating with Rainbow organisations and hopes to continue expanding the collection with tertiary institutions, museums, galleries, and individuals in the future.

Visit the Ia~ portal.

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