Create Vision Statement

A vision statement is a compelling description of what the project could one day become. It goes beyond the project’s current parameters and goals and describes an idealized version of what your repository could be in an ideal world. When creating your vision statement, dream big. Do not worry about whether or not you can reach your idealized repository in the first 5 or even 10 years. Knowing all you know about current and emerging opportunities and reflecting your values, imagine the best possible version of your repository doing everything you could ever hope it would do.

Your vision often describes how your project will contribute to the improvement of the system in which it will function. The vision statement should be something that resonates with the members of the team and makes them excited to be a part of it.

Here are some examples of the vision statements of various repositories:

• Exploratories (http://www.cs.brown.edu/exploratories/about/home.html) "The next-generation of learning technologies, manifested as full courses and digital libraries of richly interactive educational software components ("learning objects") and curriculum units, will transform traditional teaching as well as powerful Web-based offerings. Just as film began by mimicking theater, today's Web-based courses imitate our traditional course models. In our vision, a vocabulary for this new medium, developed through parallel, mutually stimulating development of medium and content, will underlie the realization of this new genre's full impact."

• GEM (http://www.thegateway.org/about/gemingeneral/about-gem/) “GEM will be the world's leading metadata cooperative, helping educators serve students by providing access to educational knowledge through cutting edge innovation and collaboration.”

• MERLOT (http://taste.merlot.org/) "To be a premiere online community where faculty, staff, and students from around the world share their learning materials and pedagogy."