ACRL announces Kara Malenfant as new Scholarly Communications-Government Relations Specialist
Contact: Mary Ellen Davis
312-280-3248
For Immediate Release
October 3, 2005
ACRL announces Kara Malenfant as new Scholarly Communications-Government Relations Specialist
The Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) is pleased to announce the hiring of Kara Malenfant as the division's Scholarly Communications & Government Relations Specialist.
Malenfant worked at DePaul University in Chicago and brings 6 years of experience as a reference librarian and history bibliographer. She is known for her development of a university-wide information and referral service based in DePaul's library. Malenfant is also an active member of ACRL and has served as chair of ACRL's International Relations Committee from 2003-2005.
“Kara brings practical experience to this position with her knowledge of scholarly communications issues, her work in academic librarianship, her experience in grassroots advocacy, and her understanding of higher education and ACRL,” said Mary Ellen Davis, ACRL executive director. “We are delighted to have her join the ACRL team and look forward to deepening ACRL's scholarly communications and government relations initiatives.”
Ray English, director of libraries at Oberlin College and chair of the ACRL Scholarly Communications Committee, added, “Kara has great energy and enthusiasm for legislative advocacy and scholarly communications reform. I look forward to working with her as we continue to build ACRL's scholarly communications program and increase the association's effectiveness in the legislative arena.”
Prior to her experience as a librarian, Malenfant worked in Washington for the Armenian Assembly of America as the assistant director of grassroots advocacy and as a development assistant. She served as a Peace Corps volunteer in the first group posted to the Republic of Armenia.
In her new role, Malenfant will work with librarians in all types of academic libraries to foster new forms of scholarly communication that are more responsive to the needs of the academy. She will serve as an advocate for academic libraries and will work with other library and scholarly organizations to bring about positive change in the system of scholarly communication. She will coordinate ACRL's legislative initiative developing strategies to influence legislation affecting academic and research libraries. Within ACRL, she will provide staff support for the Scholarly Communications Committee, the Scholarly Communications Discussion Group, the Government Relations Committee and the Advocacy Coordinating Committee.
Malenfant received a bachelor of arts in English from Allegheny College and a master's in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
ACRL is a division of the American Library Association (ALA), representing more than 13,000 academic and research librarians and interested individuals. ACRL is the only individual membership organization in North America that develops programs, products and services to meet the unique needs of academic and research librarians. Its initiatives enable the higher education community to understand the role that academic libraries play in the teaching, learning and research environments.
