Scholaris is a shared institutional repository service built on DSpace and maintained by Scholars Portal.
Launched in 2024 with two cohorts of early adopters, this service continues to grow and develop thanks to contributions from the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL), University of Toronto Libraries, Canada’s regional university library consortia, and the expert support of library and repository community members.
Scholars Portal hosts regular information sessions open to members of the repository community. To RSVP for upcoming events or to view past session recordings please see the Scholaris Community Resources page.
Scholaris is currently available to participants via an Early Adopter model, with Cohorts 1 and 2 beginning migration to the platform in 2024.
Applications for Cohort 3 are now open for COPPUL members interested in participating in 2025-2026.
More information on the Early Adopter Program and how to apply to participate in Cohort 3 can be found on the Scholaris SpotDocs wiki.
Eligibility and pricing
COPPUL member institutions are eligible to participate under the COPPUL Access and Service Agreement. Pricing for Early Adopters includes set-up and migration support as well as optional features. Please contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator at cdsn@coppul.ca for details.
Borealis, the Canadian Dataverse Repository, is a bilingual, multidisciplinary, secure, Canadian research data repository, supported by academic libraries and research institutions across Canada. Borealis supports open discovery, management, sharing, and preservation of Canadian research data.
Affiliate membership is open to the library of any non-profit Canadian college or university. Membership inquiries are welcome–please contact cdsn@coppul.ca or execdir@coppul.ca.
Pricing
Pricing is primarily based on CRKN tiers.
Fees for non-CRKN banded institutions are based on student FTE.
The Borealis subscription term currently runs May 1, 2025-April 30, 2026, but new participants are welcome throughout the year. Please contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator, to initiate or discuss the sign-up process.
New subscribers will be provided with a short online sign-up form to complete. This collects information necessary for setting up and provisioning access to your Borealis instance. To support planning, we recommend providing this information at least 5-10 business days prior to your desired start date.
Archive-It is the leading web archiving solution for a wide range of organizations, including academic, federal, state or local libraries, archives, and other cultural heritage institutions. Since its launch in 2006, over 600 partner organizations have used Archive-It’s end-to-end hosted solution to create, store, and provide access to collections of web content. With Consortia Canada, COPPUL coordinates Archive-It subscriptions for Canada’s University Libraries and CGI-DPN participants.
Arca is a hosted, Islandora-based repository platform made available to COPPUL members through partnership with the BC Electronic Library Network (BC ELN). Integration between Arca and WestVault allows users of both services to quickly and easily set up deposits from repository to preservation storage.
As of 2025, COPPUL is an Associate Member of the Digital Preservation Coalition. The DPC is an international organization dedicated to supporting sustainable long-term access to digital materials by promoting good practice, community involvement, and advocacy.
The DPC provides a host of freely accessible resources on digital stewardship including guides, toolkits, case studies, assessment models, online courses, and events. To access these free resources and learn more about the DPC, please see their website.
Services
COPPUL offers the following opt-in services to members and select partners at additional cost. These support sustainable stewardship of digital collections throughout their life cycle.
Arca is a hosted, Islandora-based repository platform made available to COPPUL members through partnership with the BC Electronic Library Network (BC ELN). Integration with WestVault allows users of both services to quickly and easily flag content for deposit to preservation storage in the Arca collection manager interface.
Archive-It is a web archiving service provided by the Internet Archive. With Consortia Canada, COPPUL coordinates annual Archive-It subscriptions for Canada’s University Libraries.
Borealis is a repository designed to support stewardship of research data. This hosted version is made available in partnership with University of Toronto Libraries and Scholars Portal, who operate Borealis as a national service in collaboration with regional academic library consortia.
Scholaris is a shared institutional repository service built on DSpace and maintained by Scholars Portal. This service is currently available to participants via an Early Adopter model, with Cohorts 1 and 2 beginning migration to the platform in 2024. More information on the Early Adopter Program and how to apply to participate in Cohort 3 can be found on the Scholaris SpotDocs wiki.
For more information about these services, including participation options and pricing, please see the above links or contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator (cdsn@coppul.ca).
The COPPUL Western Web Archiving Community supports regional collaboration around shared web archiving opportunities and challenges. Members work in coordination with the Canadian Web Archiving Coalition, CGI-DPN, and other allied communities of practice to amplify and complement one another’s efforts. Membership is open to all individuals with an interest in preserving web content of regional significance.
Purpose
Reporting to the CDSN Standing Committee, the COPPUL Western Web Archiving Community (WWAC) will be responsible for:
Increasing communication and collaboration between web archiving practitioners across BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba.
Investigating opportunities for regional collaboration in the development of new and existing web archive collections.
Advising the CDSN on opportunities to address gaps in the availability and accessibility of infrastructure and tools needed to support the long-term stewardship of web content.
Helping to build capacity to carry out web archiving activities at the regional and local levels, complementing the Canadian Web Archiving Coalition’s (CWAC) national-scale efforts.
Collaborating with other allied organizations at the local, regional, national, and international levels, as applicable. Membership
Membership
Membership is open to any interested individual. This includes practitioners currently engaged in web archiving work, along with those interested in learning more. Individuals from allied GLAM institutions outside COPPUL’s membership are welcome.
This group is currently on hiatus. Please contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator (cdsn@coppul.ca) for more information.
The Preservation Infrastructure Working Group (PIWG) guides the CDSN’s efforts to build and support community-based digital preservation infrastructure at the regional, national, and international levels. Inclusive access to this evolving set of tools helps our members tackle the grand challenges associated with preserving digital information for future generations.
Purpose
The Preservation Infrastructure Working Group (PIWG) supports the COPPUL Digital Stewardship Network Standing Committee (CDSN SC) in its efforts to manage and further develop COPPUL’s preservation infrastructure. Reporting to the CDSN SC, and working in close collaboration with the CDSN Coordinator, the PIWG is an action-oriented working group that provides direction around preservation infrastructure strategy, operations, policy, and service planning.
Connect, participate, or learn more
To discuss joining the PIWG, to learn about its work, or to chat about opportunities for collaboration around preservation infrastructure, please contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator (cdsn@coppul.ca).
As part of a broader strategy to build digital preservation capacity among COPPUL members, this committee has been tasked with fostering a vibrant community of practice, and connecting members with professional development opportunities by coordinating networking events, curating and sharing best practice resources, and more. As of fall 2025 the committee has implemented a rotating chair structure, where all members of the committee have the opportunity to lead and shape our meetings and agenda.
To express interest in joining the planning committee, or to propose a community event, please contact Y.G. Rancourt, CDSN Coordinator.
Communication Channels
The CDSN Community of Practice is an inclusive community of practice with membership open to any interested individual. Members and allied GLAM partners are encouraged to join our mailing list for news about upcoming events, information about professional development resources, and more.
Resource Library
We maintain a shared library of publicly accessible digital stewardship resources such as reports, articles, guidelines for best practice, and more using Zotero. Let us know if there’s a digital stewardship resource you’d like to see added to the list!
The CDSN Standing Committee guides COPPUL’s overall efforts to build capacity for digital preservation. It provides expert advice and strategic insight to the CDSN Coordinator, Executive Director, and the Board. Membership consists of a balance of experts and those seeking to expand their knowledge of the preservation landscape.
Mission
The COPPUL Digital Stewardship Network (CDSN) builds capacity for digital preservation at COPPUL member institutions. We help our members preserve, manage, and provide access to their digital collections by:
Offering a world-class suite of technology, infrastructure, and services
Creating a vibrant community of practice
Increasing awareness among a wide range of stakeholders
Offering educational and professional development opportunities
Collaborating with allied organizations across Canada and the world
Nothing has been preserved, there are only things being preserved. Preservation is the result of ongoing work of people and commitments of resources.
Trevor Owens, The Theory and Craft of Digital Preservation
The digital preservation landscape is complex and is always evolving. As collections have become increasingly digital, memory institutions like university archives and libraries have recognized the need for solutions that address the challenges associated with their ongoing stewardship responsibilities.
Digital Preservation at COPPUL
2007: COPPUL has been active in digital preservation since the establishment of the COPPUL Private LOCKSS Network in 2007.
2015: The COPPUL Digital Preservation Working Group established the COPPUL Digital Preservation Network (COPPUL DPN) with the intention of transforming COPPUL’s digital preservation activities into a set of comprehensive, flexible, scalable, and sustainable services that help members steward their digital collections into the future.
2018-2025: WestVault superseded the previous COPPUL Private LOCKSS Network (COPPUL PLN), employing the award-winning LOCKSS software to provide a high-redundancy, independently-administered peer storage network spread across all 4 Western provinces thanks to the support of our members and partnering institutions.
Present: The CDSN’s services continue to evolve in line with emerging opportunities and challenges in the digital preservation space.
Guiding principles
The COPPUL Digital Stewardship Network (CDSN) builds capacity for digital preservation at COPPUL member institutions. We help our members preserve, manage, and provide access to their digital collections by:
1. Offering a world-class suite of technology, infrastructure, and services
We foster peer networks to help increase digital preservation capacity through meaningful collaboration. This includes our Community of Practice (formerly Peer Services Community) and proposed Western Web Archiving Community.
3. Increasing awareness among a wide range of stakeholders
We support efforts to promote awareness of digital preservation opportunities and challenges, often in close collaboration with allied organizations, along with efforts to advocate for resources on member campuses.
4. Offering educational and professional development opportunities
We offer an array of educational programming and professional development opportunities, including our Community of Practice webinar series and virtual meet-ups. These address topics of interest to our peer networks, and create opportunities for COPPUL’s nodes of excellence to share expertise with colleagues.
5. Collaborating with allied organizations regionally, nationally, and internationally
We build partnerships in order to amplify our efforts, achieve economies of scale, and provide our members with the resources they need. This includes working towards national-scale infrastructure solutions, as applicable, to meet the needs of our members.
Governance
The CDSN Standing Committee guides COPPUL’s efforts to build capacity for digital preservation.
The Community of Practice Planning Committee works to foster knowledge sharing among preservation practitioners and to connect its members with relevant educational and professional development opportunities.
The Western Web Archiving Community brings together web archiving practitioners across BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, facilitating collaboration that helps preserve at-risk web content of regional significance.
Collaborations
The COPPUL Digital Stewardship Network (CDSN) works with a wide variety of regional, national and international partners. Our collaborative projects and initiatives have a meaningful impact on COPPUL members’ ability to undertake effective digital preservation.
