About Us
The 10,000-square-foot Digital Scholarship Lab in the Main Library features a 360-degree immersive visualization room that accommodates up to 20 people, a Virtual Reality Room for experimentation with VR headsets, a high-powered computer lab, and a digitization room. Through its Flex Space, Computer Classroom, project rooms, and research incubator space in the DSL Extension, the DSL offers formal gathering areas to facilitate cross-disciplinary collaboration.
As a unit, the DSL has faculty and staff that support immersive technologies, digital scholarship, and data services through consultations, course-embedded session, workshops, and programs. We partner with colleagues in the MSU Libraries, the College of Arts and Letters, and through the Research Facilitation Network. Learn more about the DSL Team.
Our Mission
The Digital Scholarship Lab (DSL) transforms teaching and research by providing expertise, programs, spaces, and technologies that support immersive visualization, digital scholarship, and data services.
Our Vision
The expertise, resources, and partnerships of the Digital Scholarship Lab amplify the positive impact of the MSU community and demonstrate the value of centering experimentation in the Libraries.
Our Values
The DSL:
- Welcomes everyone from any discipline and level of experience and adapt our services to meet their needs.
- Encourages curiosity, ideation, and creativity through novel applications of digital technologies and methodologies across disciplines.
- Thrives on collaboration and partnerships with our constituents and colleagues in the Libraries and across campus.
- Advocates for learner-centered spaces, technologies, and programs that reflect the needs of our community and strive to recognize and overcome the biases built into systems.
- Continuously learns and shares our expertise so our constituents can advance their own digital scholarship projects and activities.
- Is dedicated to supporting our community with clear communication about the scope of our programs, services, technologies, and spaces.
Our Strategic Directions (2026-2030)
- Provide exceptional experiential learning opportunities by leveraging DSL expertise and technology through class support, workshops, and instructor training programs.
- Enhance services, programs, and systems for immersive technologies to meet learning and research goals of campus collaborators, prioritizing scalable use cases and models that inspire adoption and application across disciplines.
- Establish DSL as the central service point for research data services in the MSU Libraries, developing a catalog of services and training programs in collaboration with partners in the Research Facilitation Network (RFN).
- Sustain and grow digital scholarship programs in partnership with DH@MSU by identifying resources that attract participants to the Project Incubator, graduate fellowship opportunities, and community-engaged efforts.
- Continually improve communication and storytelling about the DSL’s activities and services through the website, social media platforms, outreach, internal workflows, and documentation.
View DSL strategic directions with notes about how we can an achieve them
Our Community
Students in every major may use the advanced and graphics-intensive computing software and interactive visualization for research projects and scholarly exploration. Offering extended hours, including nights and weekends, to accommodate the realities of student life, this space is unique among specialized computing spaces on campus.
We support innovative research and instruction by supporting the adoption of digital methods and data management practices. Librarians and faculty partners across disciplines engage in a wide range of research and pedagogical endeavors through consultation, advising, workshops, and instruction sessions.
The DSL is adjacent to Hollander Print and Production Center on the second floor of the Main Library’s west wing, extending the MSU Libraries’ support for emerging technologies for teaching and learning across disciplines.