Washington, D.C.-Nancy Davenport has announced that she will step down as president of the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) at the end of her current term, June 30, 2006. She made the announcement at the April 28 CLIR Board of Directors meeting, where she thanked the Board “for the privilege and trust you bestowed in giving me the opportunity to lead CLIR.”
Charles Phelps, provost at the University of Rochester and chairman of the Board, thanked Ms. Davenport for her work and contributions. He cited her leadership in convening respected voices and defining issues relating to CLIR’s priorities in preservation and scholarly communication. Ms. Davenport, he noted, has also had a key role in launching CLIR’s “place as library” initiative, which is examining libraries’ current efforts to transcend physical structures in order to better serve users and their communities. “Place as library is a complex agenda,” Dr. Phelps noted, “and we are grateful to have had Nancy Davenport at our helm to begin the process of addressing the issues related to this important new initiative.”
Before her appointment as president of CLIR in 2004, Ms. Davenport served more than 25 years at the Library of Congress, ultimately as director of acquisitions. Throughout her career, she has been active in professional library associations. While at CLIR, she was a member of the Council and Executive Board of the American Library Association, and she currently serves on the Board of the National Information Standards Organization (NISO).
“CLIR is a small, flexible organization that is focused on change,” said Ms. Davenport. “I am confident that CLIR will emerge from this transition with a renewed commitment to the complex intellectual and professional issues that face the library community.”
The Board has appointed an interim administrative subcommittee and has begun a search for a successor to Ms. Davenport.
The Council on Library and Information Resources is an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the management of information for research, teaching, and learning. CLIR works to expand access to information, however recorded and preserved, as a public good.
