Dean German Elected to SPARC Steering Committee
Dean Lisa German has been elected to the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) Steering Committee.
Lisa German, dean of the University of Houston Libraries and Elizabeth D. Rockwell Chair, has been elected to the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) Steering Committee for a three-year term running from January 2016 through December 2018.
SPARC is an international alliance of academic and research libraries working to create a more open system of scholarly communication. SPARC’s activities are focused on open access to scholarly and scientific research articles, open data, and open educational resources.
Before joining UH, German served as associate dean for collections, information, and access services at Penn State University, and has also held leadership positions at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Wright State University. She joined UH in 2015.
German has widely published and presented in the areas of library collections, management, planning, policy development, implementation and assessment. She is co-author of the 2013 book, SPEC Kit 339: Innovation and R&D in Libraries, an examination of the role of research libraries in the strategic advancement of innovative measures. Consistently engaged in professional development, German has participated in the Leadership Institute for Academic Librarians at Harvard University, as well as the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Research Library Leadership Fellows Program.
German is active in professional service at the university, regional, and national levels, having chaired a number of committees on various aspects of acquisitions and technical services. She has served on several editorial and advisory boards, including a current appointment for Library Resources and Technical Services. Notable for her expertise in collections, technical services, organizational and workflow assessment, as well as strategy, German has been a sought-after consultant to academic research libraries on an international scale.