Past President's Page

Beth McNeil
ACRL Past-President
2024–2025

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Biographical Information

Beth McNeil joined Purdue University as Dean of Libraries and School of Information Studies and Esther Ellis Norton Professor of Library Science in 2019. Prior to joining Purdue, she was Dean of Library Services at Iowa State University (2015-2019), held associate dean positions in the libraries at Purdue University (2007-2015) and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (1996-2007), and began her professional career as an assistant professor and reference librarian (1989-1996) at Bradley University in Peoria, IL.

She is the author of Fundamentals of Library Supervision (2017, 2010, and 2005) and Core Competencies (2002), and co-authored Advocacy, Outreach and the Nations Libraries: A Call for Action (2010) and Patron Behavior in Libraries: A Handbook of Positive Approaches to Negative Situations (1996), as well as several journal articles on library management, supervision, and human resources-related topics.

McNeil serves on the SPARC Steering Committee and the Academic Libraries of Indiana board. She is a past board member of the HathiTrust, the Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA), Western Regional Storage Trust (WEST), the Rosemont Shared Print Alliance, and the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL), and served as chair of the 2021 ACRL National Conference, “Ascending into an Open Future.”

Education

Ph.D., human sciences, leadership studies focus, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

M.S., library and information science, University of Illinois-Urbana

A.B., English, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign

Research areas:

Library administration and management, human resources, leadership studies.