Career Progression
In its first year of activity, the joint Task Force on Career Progression recruited over 20 volunteers drawn from the membership of the Association of University Presses and the Society for Scholarly Publishing. Meeting monthly, the group gathered over 1,300 scholarly publishing position descriptions; created an authoritative coding process; and submitted over 130 template position descriptions to the University of Michigan doctoral student for analysis. The Task Force will continue into a second year with an additional partner, Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers, and the ultimate goal of producing a database of common position descriptions for use by individuals and organizations.
Lisa Bayer, Georgia, Chair
Angela Anderson, Marine Corps
David Aycock, Baylor
Rebecca Bostock, Ohio State
Hilary Claggett, Georgetown
Becky Brasington Clark, Library of Congress
Catherine Cocks, Michigan State
Tara Cyphers, Ohio State
Kelly Finefrock, Alabama
Craig W. Gill, Mississippi
Dominique Moore, Illinois
Kristin Harpster, Wayne State
Kim Robinson, California
Patrick Samuel, Vanderbilt
Amy Sherman, Pittsburgh
Adele Sommerville, North Carolina
Rich Schrader, Senior HR Business Partner, University of Michigan, Consultant
Charles Watkinson, Michigan, Board Liaison
Peter Berkery and Brenna McLaughlin, Central Office Liaisons
University Press Week
The University Press Week Task Force led a very successful University Press Week campaign in November 2022 focused on the theme #NextUP. The highlight of the week’s national media attention was an opinion piece in the New York Times by Margaret Renkl. In addition, the week received coverage in Lit Hub, Publishers Weekly “Soap Box,” Shelf Awareness Pro, New Books Network, Publishing Perspectives, and Library Journal. The Raven Bookstore and Seminary Co-op hosted in-person events, in addition to a Zoom panel led by the Coop. A third poetry-centered event was scheduled to be hosted by Book Culture but was canceled. Both the gallery and the blog tour continued to have strong engagement, and an updated social media toolkit that grouped the gallery entries into themes and subject areas offered an effective approach that will be built upon in future campaigns. In addition, the group also updated the bookstore toolkit and began to reach out more aggressively to bookselling partners to encourage collaboration. While incredibly happy with the attention that UP Week received in 2022, the task torce ended the year with a lot of great ideas to expand upon in 2023 in which it hopes to have record levels of participation across the AUPresses community.
Carrie Adams, Chicago
Mike Byer, Toronto
Catherine Hobbs, Columbia
Mary Beth Jarrad, New York
Suzan Kenawy, Cairo
Micah Kleit, Rutgers
Gigi Lamm, Pennsylvania
Kathryn Lloyd, Texas A & M
Lisa Savage, Duke
Nicole Utter, Michigan State
Colleen Lanick, Harvard, Board Liaison
Annette Windhorn, Central Office Liaison