Create Mission Statement

With any project, it is important to articulate the mission of the enterprise from the very beginning. A mission statement is a precise description of the project’s purpose and expected results. It should lay out the reasons for the project’s existence and what is to be achieved.

In establishing your mission statement, ask some basic questions about the project. Why did you want to set up a repository in the first place? What needs are being addressed and how will the repository meet those needs? The mission should be in step with the values and vision you have set out in the previous steps.

Here are some examples of the mission statements of various repositories from around the world:

• The Orange Grove (http://www.theorangegrove.org) “To enhance teaching and learning throughout the State of Florida, The Orange Grove will provide all educators with a single point of access to easily search, locate, use and share high quality instructional resources for every subject area.”

• CANARIE (http://www.canarie.ca/about/about.html)(Canada's advanced network development organization) “Accelerate Canada's advanced network development and use by facilitating the widespread adoption of faster, more efficient networks and by enabling the next generation of advanced products, applications and services to run on them.”

• Connexions (http://cnx.org/aboutus/ )"Connexions is an environment for collaboratively developing, freely sharing, and rapidly publishing scholarly content on the Web."

• Exploratories (http://www.cs.brown.edu/exploratories/about/home.html"To create a set of exemplary Web-based learning objects that teach concepts in introductory computer graphics and to document our experiences of creating useful learning objects in a Design Strategy handbook. "

• GEM (http://www.thegateway.org/about/gemingeneral/about-gem/) "The Gateway to Educational Materials SM (GEM) expands educators' capability to access Internet-based lesson plans, instructional units and other educational materials in all forms and formats. GEM's goal is to improve the organization and accessibility of the substantial collections of materials that are already available on various federal, state, university, non-profit, and commercial Internet sites."