The UKSG 49th Annual Conference and Exhibition: Glasgow – Breakout sessions

Ken works with universities, libraries, archives, local and central government, the NHS, sector bodies and businesses to help with strategy, understanding needs, business models, value propositions, user experience and innovation. He also reviews services and helps evaluate and procure new technology solutions. In 2025, in partnership with Helen Anderson Consulting, he set up a new AI initiative – ‘AkroNova’ – to provide effective user insights quickly and economically. Ken has published widely including a number of free, open access library technology ‘Briefing Papers’. He also manages Higher Education Library Technology a free, open community, open data resource.

Caroline Ball is the Community Engagement Lead for the Open Book Collective, and has previously worked as an academic librarian, copyright and licensing advisor, and lecturer in publishing. Her research interests centre on knowledge equity, information ethics, and democratisation of access to information and learning opportunities, focusing particularly on systemic barriers and biases in dominant knowledge systems. She is also an active Wikipedian, was awarded the UK Wikimedian of the Year award in 2020 and currently serves on the Wikimedia UK board of trustees.

Kirsty is currently Head of Research Liaison in UCL Library services where she leads the day-to-day running of the Office for Open Science and Scholarship, coordinating activity and advocacy across all aspects of open science. Kirsty is also a part-time PhD student in UCL’s Department of Information Studies, where she is researching the evolution of research support services in Libraries and the effect the shifting policy landscape around Open Access has had over time.

With over a decade of experience working in the Academic Publishing and Educational Technology industries, Shivendra is passionate about supporting Research and Scholarly Communications. He holds a BSc in Physics with Astrophysics, and postgraduate qualifications in Business, and Accounting & Finance. As an Engagement Manager at ORCID in the Global Direct Members team, Shivendra focuses on growing member & integration adoption; as well as collaborations with Vendors, Service Providers and Publishers who serve the wider research community.

Liz leads Jisc’s research management product strategy, with a focus on building open and interoperable datasets and services that enable better outcomes for research – driving efficiency, transparency, and collaboration across the sector.
With a background in biology, Liz began her career in academic publishing, gaining expertise in open access and open research practices. This experience sparked her interest in improving the way information flows across the research ecosystem. At Jisc, she brings this perspective to developing data and infrastructure that support the research sector in navigating an evolving policy, funding, and digital landscape

Alastair is a Research Information Administrator in the Research Information Management Team within Information Services at the University of Glasgow. His work with researchers across the University involves facilitating open research, encouraging the adoption of good research practice (such as using persistent identifiers like ORCID), supporting compliance with research funder open access and data sharing requirements. He is also responsible for the administration of research outcomes reporting to funders to demonstrate compliance with these requirements. Alastair has a MA in Politics and Economics from the University of Glasgow and a MSc in Information and Library Studies from Robert Gordon University

Dr. Mac-Anthony Cobblah has a PhD in Information Science and a regular speaker at the UKSG
Conference. He has a strong background in Open Science and Digital Scholarship. He brings on
board perspectives and insights from African continent to UKSG Conferences. Dr. Cobblah is
currently the University Librarian of the University of Cape Coast, Ghana Vice President, Africa
Library Association and Institutions (AfLIA); Chair, Governing Council of the Consortium of
Academic and Research Libraries in Ghana (CARLIGH)
He is also a member of the Advisory Board, DOAJ and the Licensing Coordinator of EIFL for

TBC

TBC.

Ciara is Faculty Librarian for Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at Lancaster University, working in the teaching and engagement team to promote library content; she also teaches library research skills for the Law School. Previously she was Librarian at Queen Elizabeth’s School in Barnet, where she set up a library from scratch and witnessed first-hand the pulling power of graphic novels. Professional interests are information literacy, engagement, and student experience. She is also a keen gardener, folk musician, lifelong reader, and firm believer that access to libraries – and librarians – improves lives.

Lizzie McCauley is a UX and accessibility specialist, working at the Open University Library. With a background that also includes content and marketing, Lizzie brings diverse experience to the role. She is responsible for the usability and accessibility of Library sites and systems, and incorporates digital sustainability and EDI initiatives into this work

Rebecca Wojturska (she/her) is the Open Access Publishing Officer at the University of Edinburgh, responsible for managing Edinburgh Diamond: the Library Publishing Partner for Diamond Open Access books and journals created by UoE academics, professional staff and students. Rebecca is also the co-lead of ALPSP Library Publishing SIG and a board member of: JEAHIL; Journal of Information Literacy; the Library Publishing Curriculum, the Open Institutional Publishing Association; the Open Journals Collective; and the PKP Members Committee. In her spare time she loves reading Gothic literature, watching horror films, playing D&D, and crushing her enemies at board games.

An avid hiker and reader Sarah is a relative newcomer to open. She has been working in the field since 2018 and became Open Scholarship Librarian in 2021. Working with a team of experts on all things open at Oxford University and facing the challenges and opportunities that such a research intensive institution can offer.

Cath is the Open Research Librarian (Scholarly Communications) at Liverpool John Moores University. She takes the lead for open access advocacy at LJMU and manages the institutional repository and open journals service. Cath has over 25 years’ experience in libraries in a range of roles from academic services, customer services, user support and most recently research support. Cath is also the Chair of CILIP’s Library and Information Research Group (LIRG) and Co-Chair of the ALPSP Library Publishing Special Interest Group

Tom is currently undertaking a secondment as the Research Culture and Open Monographs Lead at Lancaster University Library. Within this role he leads and coordinates programmes of activity to develop an Open Research Culture as well as exploring options to facilitate open monograph publishing. In his substantive post he works across the areas of Open Access, Research Intelligence and Research Data Management to coordinate and deliver a range of projects, services and initiatives as an Open Research Officer. Tom is also co-editor of the UKSG e-News,

Spence is a business intelligence analyst from Jisc’s Licensing team. He specialises in preparing and visualising data to support Jisc’s work, such as negotiations with publishers and software vendors. Before Jisc he gained experience with things like trusted research environments, collection management, reading lists, and inter-library loans for the research and higher education sectors

Caroline is a licensing manager within Jisc’s research licensing portfolio. She has negotiated a range of licensed content more recently specialising in diamond open access and supporter membership agreements. Currently her priorities are highlighting essential open infrastructure to support and applying cOAlitionS’ How Equitable is it framework to Jisc’s open access agreements.

Charlotte is a Senior Business Intelligence Analyst from the Licensing team at Jisc. She specialises in supporting Licensing’s content and software negotiations with data informed intelligence and insights. Previous to Jisc she has experience of providing bibliometric support in a higher education library.

Beth is a Principal Business Intelligence Analyst from the Licensing team at Jisc. She leads the Business Intelligence team to deliver successful data support for content and software negotiations, and provides data and analytics to monitor and assess value and impact.

Olivia is currently an Academic Liaison Librarian at the University of Wales Trinity St David (Birmingham) Prior to that, she was a former Secondary English teacher of 10+ years and former Learning Resources Manager at Sixth Form level for 6 years. Her areas of interest include equality, diversity, and inclusion; digital accessibility and the use of Generative AI to support students and staff in a higher education context.

Tom Mosterd is one of the co-founders of Sylla. He has worked for nearly a decade on supporting Higher Education – and libraries in the transition towards Open Science & Open Education. At Sylla, Tom works closely with its libraries and partners in HigherEd on advancing open and affordable learning for all.

Başak Büyükçelen is the Chief Executive Officer of Pressbooks, an open-source digital publishing platform widely used in higher education to create and share interactive learning and scholarly materials. Başak leads Pressbooks in advancing open-source digital publishing solutions that support teaching and learning. With more than a decade of experience in organizational leadership and strategy, she brings a global perspective shaped by cross-cultural collaboration and speaks four languages.

To follow

To follow

Rob Johnson is the Managing Director of Research Consulting, a mission-driven business which works to improve the effectiveness and impact of research and scholarly communication. He began his career with KPMG, the international professional services firm, before working in a senior research management role at the University of Nottingham. Since founding Research Consulting in 2013 he has led more than 150 projects in the fields of research and scholarly communication. Rob is Vice Chair of UKSG, a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and holds an MSc in Higher Education Management from Loughborough University.

Sara Rouhi is a co-author of the 2025 Declaration to #DefendResearch from US Govt Censorship, released Feb 13, 2025. With 15 years of experience in scholarly publishing, she has undergraduate and graduate degrees in political science and political theory. She brings a social science lens to the challenges of building an open science future in a shifting socio-political landscape, one very much under financial, legal, and governmental pressure. Her scholarly publishing work primarily focuses on making access to knowledge creation as sustainably open as possible by exploring partnership and non-traditional business models to enable greater participation in knowledge creation. Sara’s work with DefendResearch.org is done privately and has no relationship with her employer.

In February 2025 she joined with Lisa Schiff, Catherine Mitchell, Alice Meadows, and Peter Suber as a co-author of the Declaration to #DefendResearch Against US Government Censorship. The DefendResearch.org group is dedicated to educating the public on the dangers of censorship in science. The website includes testimonials from researchers, toolkits for lobbying and educating in local communities, and resources around data rescue and cataloging of public statements/positions that #DefendResearch against government attack. Follow the team @DefendResearch.bsky.social and Sara, herself, @RouhiRoo.bsky.social on Bluesky

Doug Way is the Dean of Libraries and William T. Young Endowed Chair at the University of Kentucky. He has previously held positions at the University of Wisconsin Madison and Grand Valley State University. Doug has written and presented widely on topics related to the use and management of library collections and scholarly communications. He has a bachelor’s degree from Grand Valley State University and a Master’s degree from Wayne State University

Katherine Stephan is the Open Research Librarian (Development) at Liverpool John Moores University in Liverpool, United Kingdom. She is an advocate for open research, responsible metrics, and author choice in publishing. She is the co-organiser of Open Research Week with Liverpool, Edge Hill and Essex Universities. She is a member of the UKSG Outreach and Engagement Subcommittee and is the librarian member of Think.Check.Submit. A keen gig goer, most years Katherine goes to more gigs than her age. Inconceivably, she has seen Liverpool legend Michael Head 37 times, with Bill Ryder-Jones a distant second

Naz Torabi serves as the Collections Coordinator, Sciences at the University of Toronto, where she is responsible for overseeing the development of a coordinated and sustainable approach to library collections across the university’s extensive library system. Her responsibilities include the acquisition, management, and assessment of electronic resources, vendor relations. She works closely with science librarians to support the evolving information needs of students and faculty. She is a 2022–2023 Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Leadership and Career Development Program (LCDP) fellow and currently serves as co-chair of VimLoC (Visible Minority Librarians of Canada

Sarah Sogigian, based in Marlborough, MA, U.S., is the Executive Director at the Massachusetts Library System (MLS). Sarah leads MLS in the offering of critical and signature services for over 1500 libraries, working closely with library staff and local, national and international organizations. She brings experience from previous roles at public libraries and nonprofits to her work. Sarah holds an MLIS in Library and Information Science from the University of Rhode Island and has been honored by local and national library organizations for her collaborative and leadership work. Sarah recognizes that interpersonal relations and ongoing professional learning are crucial to professional success.

Denise Lyons serves as the State Librarian and Commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives in Frankfort, Kentucky. She brings extensive experience in library administration and management, strategic planning, family literacy, and advancing library leadership and resiliency during disasters. Over the past 30 years, she has worked in a wide range of libraries and nonprofit organizations and remains active in several library associations. Denise holds a MLIS from the University of South Carolina and a MS in Public Services Management from DePaul University. She has also taught as a lecturer in the Information Science program at UNC Greensboro.

Matt McLain has worked in libraries for 29 years, including academic, public, and state libraries. His experiences connecting with colleagues at conferences and expanding his peer network have been re-energizing. He delights in sharing the experiences of others and incorporating the best ideas in his work

Michelle Willis currently serves as the Director of the Scotch Plains Public Library, where she oversees library operations, staff development, and strategic initiatives to meet the evolving needs of the community. Before stepping into the director role, she served as the library’s Youth Services Manager, establishing a strong reputation for innovative programming and collaborative partnerships. She holds an MLIS in Library and Information Science from Rutgers University. Michelle is active in the Public Library Association, the Association of Library Services to Children, and serves on the executive board of her local library consortium.

Tasha Mellins-Cohen, Executive Director at COUNTER Metrics and Founder of Mellins-Cohen Consulting, joined the knowledge community in 2001. She has held roles within learned societies and commercial publishers across operations, technology, editorial and executive functions, while donating time to key initiatives and bodies such as UKSG, COUNTER, ALPSP and STM. In 2020 she started consulting in response to requests for help in developing and implementing OA business models in not-for-profit groups. In 2022 she stepped up from volunteering to run COUNTER, the standard for usage metrics, alongside her consulting work.

Ben Rawlins is the associate dean for Outreach, Engagement, and Collections at the University of Kentucky Libraries. Ben has served in various leadership roles in academic libraries, including library director at Georgetown College, SUNY Geneseo, and Texas A&M International University. In his current role, Ben leads a diverse portfolio that includes reference services, educational services, collections, acquisitions, liaison services, interlibrary loan, electronic resources, open educational resources, assessment, and the branch libraries (Education, Fine Arts & Design, and Medical Center).

Christine Orr serves as BioOne’s Senior Director of Business and Community Development, driving strategic initiatives designed to advance the mission of sustainably maximizing access to research. Her portfolio includes leading efforts to achieve revenue targets, driving corporate communications, raising the profile of BioOne among strategic communities, and supporting organizational transformation via the creation of Open Access pathways and product diversification.

Sara Rouhi is the Director of Open Science and Publishing Innovation at AIP Publishing. A political science by training, she joined the scholarly publishing community as a publisher starting in 2008 and has been working at the nexus of community engagement, product development and equitable business models

Driving AIPP’s open science strategy, she focuses on developing new publishing models and sustainable business strategies to accelerate AIPP’s mission to advance pragmatic, researcher-focused open science.

Rouhi joins AIP Publishing from Public Library of Science (PLOS) where she held business development and publishing development leadership roles. Her work centers at the nexus of new business models, open science/access, and equity. She’s a vocal advocate for pragmatic, sustainable, community-driven open science strategies. She has a track record of leading agile, award winning teams at PLOS and Digital Science and received numerous awards and recognition for her work in scholarly publishing. After hours, outside of AIPP, she is a free-speech activist and co-author of the Declaration to Defend Research from US Government Censorship alongside the team at DefendResearch.org. She is also long-form improviser in the DC comedy scene and rants on all things #scholcomm, politics, free speech, and comedy on Bluesky @RouhiRoo.bsky.social

To follow

To follow

Emma Nolin is Head of Information Resources and Scholarly Publishing at Malmö University Library, a position she has held for seven years. The library maintains both extensive electronic and physical collections, which are essential for students and researchers alike. While significant development has taken place in the electronic collections, the past two years have seen a renewed focus on the print collections. As the library operates without closed stacks, active management of the physical collection is a key priority.
Emma is a member of the UKSG Education and Events Subcommittee and the LIBER Open Access Working Group. At the conference, she will share how Malmö University Library has approached curating collections in close connection with scholarly communication.

Rick Anderson is University Librarian of Brigham Young University. He has worked previously for YBP, Inc., the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, the University of Nevada, Reno, and the University of Utah. He is a regular contributor to the Scholarly Kitchen and has served as president of NASIG and of the Society for Scholarly Publishing. Rick is the author of three books, including _Scholarly Communication: What Everyone Needs to Know_ (which has been published in three languages) and of the twice-weekly blog _Vision & Balance: Leading and Managing in the Academic Library.

Ruth serves as Senior Accessibility Program Manager at Clarivate, where she partners with Academia & Government product teams to embed accessibility across product ecosystems. Prior to Clarivate, her work spans technology and public service, delivering accessibility strategy and program development at the Smithsonian, NASA, and the National Science Foundation. Across these environments, Ruth has advanced inclusive design through a sustainable approach to accessibility that shapes complex products and experiences at scale

Lizzie McCauley is a UX and accessibility specialist, working at the Open University Library. With a background that also includes content and marketing, Lizzie brings diverse experience to the role. She is responsible for the usability and accessibility of Library sites and systems, and incorporates digital sustainability and EDI initiatives into this work

Frances has 25 years of experience working in academic libraries in a variety of roles relating to academic engagement, acquisitions, metadata, print and electronic collection management, and library systems. She is currently working at the University of Birmingham in a role which includes oversight of the library’s digital systems and web sites.

Rob Johnson is the Managing Director of Research Consulting, a mission-driven business which works to improve the effectiveness and impact of research and scholarly communication. He began his career with KPMG, the international professional services firm, before working in a senior research management role at the University of Nottingham. Since founding Research Consulting in 2013 he has led more than 150 projects in the fields of research and scholarly communication. Rob is Vice Chair of UKSG, a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and holds an MSc in Higher Education Management from Loughborough University

Becky Hill has worked in academic publishing since 2011, with roles spanning Editorial, Business Development and Open Research. Her current role as Head of Open Research at Taylor & Francis, focuses on building open research publishing partnerships with research communities across Europe and the Middle East (spanning open access journals, books, and other imprints). Prior to her role at Taylor & Francis, Becky spent several years at the open research publisher, F1000, and before that held editorial roles at Routledge and Maney Publishing, working on scholarly journals within the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Hannah’s role as Open Research Development Librarian includes the management, development, and delivery of the University of Essex’s services in open research, publishing, and research visibility. Hannah also manages the Research Services Team, which builds knowledge and skills of staff and students in open research, and facilitates open access publishing

Lauren Flintoft, Research Integrity Manager, IOP Publishing
Lauren manages the Research Integrity Team at IOP Publishing, which is responsible for investigating ethical cases and developing policies and processes to uphold research integrity. After completing her master’s degree in modern history in 2017, she has worked in research integrity focused roles at both Emerald Publishing and IOP Publishing. She is currently involved in several initiatives, including the NISO CRediT taxonomy group and an STM Integrity Hub working group. Her particular areas of interest include special issue ethics and papermill prevention.

Armin Glatzmeier is based in Berlin and works at Freie Universität Berlin’s Library as a member of the Teaching and Learning Services team. Holding a PhD in Comparative Politics, he brings an academic perspective to his role. Armin specializes as a trainer in good scientific practice, focusing on academic writing skills and the responsible use of AI tools in research and education. He develops workshops for students, educators, and practitioners that address research integrity, practical skills, and the ethical use of emerging technologies.

Jennifer has worked at Manchester Metropolitan University library since 2023, first as Head of Open Research Services and more recently as Head of Digital Services and Transformation. She has previously held open research roles at the University of Salford and Leeds Beckett University. Jennifer is a UKSG Trustee and a chair of the Global Equity Network (GEN).

Dal is the Head of Learning Resources and Student Experience at Coventry University, focusing on Open Education Resources. With a career in academic libraries spanning nearly three decades, Dal was also Project Manager for one of Europe’s largest textbook schemes providing students with seamless access to essential learning materials.
Passionate about accessible learning, she is dedicated to exploring emerging technologies and enhancing student experience through innovative resource strategies

Sam Eerdmans is one of the co-founders of Sylla and the Director of Business & Operations. At Sylla, Sam works in a dynamic role across business, customer success and operations. In this role, he works closely with Sylla’s library partners around the world in the US, UK and Australia – helping them to drive and grow OER success locally.

Gráinne leads the Research Integrity / Publication Ethics team at Karger Publishers, responsible for developing research integrity policies and conducting investigations for all Karger publications and is an elected COPE Council member as of 2025. She completed her PhD in Integrative Neuroscience at Cardiff University in the UK and then spent several years as a researcher at Cardiff University and Imperial College London. Since 2017 she has been working in research integrity teams at publishers and she established the team at Karger Publishers in 2021. In this role, she is particularly interested in research integrity, promoting activities that enhance transparency and the reproducibility of research

Gearóid Ó Faoleán is a Licensing Manager at Jisc, where he primarily negotiates and manages licensing agreements with academic publishers on behalf of the UK HEI and research institution sector.
He previously worked for a decade in academic publishing, beginning as a publisher at Frontiers in Lausanne, Switzerland. He moved to London in 2016 to establish and lead their Research Integrity team for five years, before joining Taylor & Francis in 2020 heading up the humanities and social sciences portfolio for their F1000 imprint.
Gearóid holds a PhD in modern Irish history and continues to publish regularly on the period.

Luqman Muraina is a final year Global Development PhD researcher at the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of York. Luqman has four years of teaching and research assistantship experience and is currently engaged as a GTA, Research Associate, and a Graduate Engagement Lead for Open Research at the University of York’s library. He supports the university’s commitment towards making Open Research as a default research practice. He researches on decolonisation, higher education, politics of knowledge, and post-colonial African development and looking forward to research roles in the academia and/or social justice institutions.

Rebecca Wojturska (she/her) is the Open Access Publishing Officer at the University of Edinburgh, responsible for managing Edinburgh Diamond: the Library Publishing Partner for Diamond Open Access books and journals created by UoE academics, professional staff and students. Rebecca is also the co-lead of ALPSP Library Publishing SIG and a board member of: JEAHIL; Journal of Information Literacy; the Library Publishing Curriculum, the Open Institutional Publishing Association; the Open Journals Collective; and the PKP Members Committee. In her spare time she loves reading Gothic literature, watching horror films, playing D&D, and crushing her enemies at board games.

Amina Malik is a Digital Publishing Librarian and Bridge to Faculty Research Associate at the University of Illinois Chicago. Rooted in cultural heritage work, her research has speculated workflows that steward the ethical hosting and exhibiting of archival materials on or belonging to underrepresented communities in academia. Malik also supports students, scholars and instructors across campus to explore open access publishing trends that best fit their interests in curating their digital scholarly presence and learning environment. Collectively, her service and research interests fall under the umbrella of fostering inclusivity towards expressing oneself, or special collections onto digital publishing platforms.

Sandra De Groote started her career at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) in 1998 as a health science librarian. In 2009, Sandy became the Scholarly Communications Librarian. Sandy is currently the Head of Scholarly Communications at UIC, which includes initiatives such as digital publishing, open access publishing, open education resources, impact metrics, data management, and digital scholarship. Her research examines the impact of the library on faculty productivity and student success. Sandy earned her M.L.I.S. and her B.A. in Psychology from the University of Western Ontario, and her M.Ed. from UIC.

Eilish Purton is an Open Research & Scholarship Librarian at the University of Sussex. She is also chair of the CILIP LGBTQ+ committee. She has worked in libraries across the UK and is broadly interested in digital technology’s impact on information access. Although she works in Brighton, Eilish lives in Portsmouth. Outside of libraries, she likes spending time at home with her four pet bunny rabbits.