Discovery Profile System
About Discovery
Through the Elements System's Discovery module, GW faculty members have the option to create public-facing profiles. The Discovery module creates a public database showcasing faculty scholarship, teaching, and professional and academic service.
Key Features of Discovery
- Discovery creates public-facing faculty profiles using data stored in Elements. The platform is designed to make it easier for GW collaborators and external partners to identify and connect with GW faculty based on their research interests, publications, teaching, and scholarly activities.
- You can choose whether or not to have a public profile in Discovery. To create your Discovery profile, change the privacy setting on your Elements User Profile from Internal to Public. You can change this setting at any time.
- Your Discovery profile will not include all information from your Elements profile. Instead, it creates a curated public profile displaying only select information from Elements. Please review this Elements to Discovery Guide to understand in detail which Elements objects and information will appear in your Discovery profile.
Frequently Asked Questions: Discovery Module - General
- What is the difference between my Elements User Profile and my Discovery profile?
Your Elements User Profile contains records of your scholarship, service, and teaching, with some records imported from GW and external databases as well as those you manually enter. Your Elements User profile is only ever visible to other GW Elements users who are logged into the Elements system.
Your Discovery profile is created when you set your Elements User Profile privacy setting to “Public.” This Discovery profile appears publicly in a database of GW faculty profiles. It contains select information from your Elements User Profile. To learn about how information from Elements appears in Discovery, please review the Elements to Discovery Guide.
- How can I highlight specific objects on my Discovery profile, such as a journal article?
On the Elements page for each object, you will find a heart icon. Click this icon to select that object as a Favorite. If you have an object marked as a Favorite, and its privacy setting is set to Public, it will appear at the top of the corresponding tab on your Discovery profile. For example, your journal articles marked as Favorites will appear at the top of the Scholarly & Creative Works tab on your Discovery profile.
- What labels are available to add to my Discovery profile, and how do I add or edit them?
You can add or edit these labels in Elements. When you go to your Elements profile, make sure you are in "Edit Mode" rather than "View Mode." Scroll down on the page to find the "Labels" heading. The currently available label schemes are Fields of Research and UN Sustainable Development Goals. Add or remove labels from either label scheme by clicking its "Manage labels" link.
If you have set your profile to "Public," these labels will appear in the "About" tab on your Discovery profile.
Frequently Asked Questions: Discovery Module and Privacy
- What information in my Elements account will be displayed on my Discovery profile?
Please review the Elements to Discovery guide to understand in detail which Elements objects and information will appear in your Discovery profile.
Please note that the following Teaching & Supervision activities will not be displayed in your Discovery profile:
- Course-based degree supervision
- Graduate examination
- Mentoring
- Research-based degree supervision
- What should I do if I do not want a Discovery profile?
In this case, please keep your Elements User Profile privacy setting set to Internal. With this privacy setting, you will not have a Discovery profile.
- Will my Annual Reports be visible on Discovery?
Your Annual Reports will not be visible on your Discovery profile. Some Elements items that you will enter in your Annual Report, such as publications and professional activities, will also be visible on your Discovery profile, if the privacy settings on those items are set to Public. For details on which information from Elements will appear in your Discovery profile, please review this Elements to Discovery Guide.
- What should I do if I want to have a public profile in Discovery, but want to prevent specific items from appearing on my public profile?
You can change the privacy setting on any object by clicking on the globe icon on that object's page in your Elements User Profile. Objects will only appear in Discovery if their privacy setting is set to Public. Change an object's privacy setting to Internal (visible in Elements to other GW users) or Private (visible only to you and select Elements users, such as system administrators) to ensure it will not appear in your Discovery profile.