FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
INDIANAPOLIS — Readers of College & Research Libraries have selected an article written by IUPUI University Library Dean David W. Lewis as one of seven “landmark” articles to be published in a special journal for the association’s 75th anniversary.
Originally published in July 1988, Lewis’ article “Inventing the Electronic University” foreshadowed many of the key technologies, such as the digital collection, that University Library at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis and the campus are leveraging today to effectively engage with students and the wider community.
Lewis argued that the rapid evolution of information technology employed in teaching, learning and research presages a “fundamental change” in higher education that will require academic libraries to be less concerned with “the automation of old systems” and more concerned with the “restructuring of institutions.”
“David Lewis’ innovation and leadership have a lasting legacy in IUPUI’s pioneering efforts to integrate information technology across the academic enterprise, especially in University Library,” said Nasser Paydar, executive vice chancellor and chief academic officer. “He is most deserving of this recognition as a national thought-leader and author from College & Research Libraries’ 75-year history.”
Lewis is also Indiana University assistant vice president for digital scholarly communication and as such has responsibility for advancing the university’s efforts to foster open access to scholarly research by developing new models for scholarly publication that enable scholars, and their collective communities, to re-assert control over rights to scholarship literature.
In March, the editorial board and past editors of College & Research Libraries identified 30 articles from the journal’s history, including Lewis’, as finalists for publication in the special issue scheduled for March 2015. Readers were asked to select six articles from the 30, plus a reader’s choice, for publication.
College & Research Libraries is the official scholarly research journal of the Association of College & Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association. More than 300 readers voted on the landmark articles. The chosen articles will also be a topic for discussion at the Association of College Research Libraries 2015 Conference in Portland, Ore.
“Reviewing every article published in the journal since 1939 reminded the editorial board of the incredible contributions that our authors have made to research and practice in academic librarianship over the past 75 years, and we are looking forward to reflecting on those contributions and considering what they mean for the future of research in our field with the publication of this special issue in March 2015,” said C&RL Editor Scott Walter of DePaul University.
Located at 755 W. Michigan St. in the heart of the IUPUI campus, University Library is a public library, serving nearly 1 million visitors a year, 10 percent of them community users. University Library supports students and faculty across all of IUPUI’s more than 200 degree programs with research expertise and a wide array of resources. Any resident of Indiana is eligible for an IUPUI University Library card.