Acquisitions Editorial
The Acquisitions Editorial Committee continued to foster community among acquisitions staff by providing programming and other opportunities for learning and professional development. The committee completed and distributed the AUPresses faculty editorial board survey; organized AUPresses panels and Hangouts about important topics and emerging concerns within scholarly publishing; liaised with members of the EJIB committee; promoted equitable, inclusive, and ethical editorial and workplace practices; and shared resources that support editors and acquisitions staff in their work.
Carli Hansen, Toronto, Co-Chair
Elisabeth Maselli, Pennsylvania, Co-Chair
Elizabeth Demers, Michigan
Gabriela Bueno Gibbs, MIT
Stephanye Hunter, Florida
Yasmine Hung, Hong Kong,
Margo Irvin, California
Alison Syring, Illinois
Rachael Levay, Princeton, Board Liaison
Brenna McLaughlin, Central Office Liaison
Annual Meeting 2025
The 2025 Annual Meeting Program Committee’s (AMPC) primary objective was to organize the main program and procure speakers, panelists, and moderators for the 2025 Annual Meeting to be held virtually on June 9–12. The AMPC is very pleased that most, if not all, functional areas of university press publishing are equally represented in the 2025 program, including sessions that offer a particular focus on open access publishing, professional development, and issues of equity, justice, inclusion, and belonging. There is a significant concentration of sessions that will be of particular interest to those involved in press and program management. The opening and closing plenary speakers will focus on diversity and the practical implications of AI.
Although many participants may miss the interpersonal benefits of an in-person meeting, we are certain that the online format will inspire ongoing conversations about academic publishing’s role in both the larger and smaller communities we serve, particularly in these difficult and uncertain times. Furthermore, we strongly believe that the online format allows for those who otherwise would not be able to make the in-person meeting to attend and participate. We are excited about the multitude of topics represented in the program and the diversity of speakers and moderators, many of whom will be participating in the program for the very first time. We also want to note that organization of the 2026 AMPC is already underway with significant engagement and buy-in from returning AMPC members and incoming AUPresses President Dennis Lloyd (Wisconsin).
David Famiano, California, Co-Chair
Ana Maria Jimenez-Moreno, Ohio State, Co-Chair
Carina Bolaños Lewen, Minnesota
Marlee Brooks, Johns Hopkins
Rebecca Brutus, Cornell
David Juarez, Notre Dame
Anjanie Kashidas, Duke
Ally Laird, Penn State
Michelle Sybert, Notre Dame
Alison Welsby, Liverpool
Anastasia Wraight, Michigan State
Anthony Cond, Liverpool, Board Liaison
Alexis Fagan, Central Office Liaison
Trevor Nau, Central Office Staff Support
Annual Meeting 2026
With planning season approaching, the Annual Meeting Committee is soon to begin organizing the program, and procuring speakers, panelists, and moderators for AUPresses 2026. Returning as an in-person meeting in June 2026 in Seattle, Washington, the committee is looking forward to planning a dynamic program filled with thought-provoking plenaries, informative concurrent sessions, interactive collaboration labs, and networking events—and that embraces accessibility and inclusivity.
Pending, Chair
Dennis Lloyd, Wisconsin, Board Liaison
Alexis Fagan, Central Office Liaison
Trevor Nau, Central Office Staff Support
Book, Jacket, and Journal Show
The Book, Jacket, and Journal Show Committee ensures the continued success and visibility of the show through the work of a strong committee with each person participating in a productive fashion. The committee maintains year-round visibility in the AUPresses and graphic design communities through the AUPresses Design website and @AUPressesDesign social media account on Instagram. The 2025 show, once again, showcases the breadth and depth of design and typography accomplished by member presses of the Association. The traveling exhibit will continue, with the show touring university presses across the US and Canada from September 2025 through June 2026. The 2024 show completed its first-ever UK route, appearing at UP Redux Conference in Oxford; Manchester University Press; and Liverpool University Press in April-May 2025.
Michelle van der Merwe, British Columbia, Chair
Shiraz Abdullahi Gallab, Michigan
Ashley Bernicky, Toronto
Alison Cobra, Calgary
Jennifer Conn, Wisconsin
David Zielonka, Stanford
Isaac Morris, New Mexico
Corey Parson, North Georgia
Peter Perez, North Carolina
Hilary Claggett, Georgetown, Board Liaison
Kate Kolendo, Central Office Liaison
Trevor Nau, Central Office Staff Support
Business Operations
The general objective of the Business Operations Committee is to develop and manage tools, programs, and resources to assist Association members in improving the financial management and analysis of their presses. This committee got a late start, beginning in October of 2024. Immediately we were faced with planning the annual Business Operations Meeting. That meeting will be held on April 23-25, 2025 in Chicago. Several of the topics address our mission, we have planned a session on how to improve the annual financial report to receive more responses, another on Accessibility, inventory management, and internal communications.
Alice Ennis, Illinois, Co-Chair
Steve Young, British Columbia, Co-Chair
Teresa Collins, Kentucky
Susan Doerr, Minnesota
Scot Kuehm, Princeton
Amy Liu, Oklahoma
Wynona McCormick, Texas A&M
Alexander Saucedo, Chicago Press
Erich van Rijn, California
Daniel Velasquez, Harvard Education
Alexandria Leonard, Princeton, Board Liaison
Kim Miller, Central Office Liaison
Alexis Fagan, Central Office Liaison
Editorial, Design, and Production
The Editorial, Design, and Production (EDP) Committee has traditionally assisted the Annual Meeting Program Committee in fostering EDP content as part of its charge to develop and manage tools, programs, and resources to support the editorial, design, and production departments of member presses. Over the past year, the committee has also organized a two-part webinar on AI for university presses. Future initiatives could include generating a list of resources based on the AI workshop as well as continuing to develop tools and training to assist university presses with the new opportunities and challenges inherent in increasingly advanced AI. The EDP committee also participated in a joint taskforce with the Marketing and Journals Committee on current practices related to metadata and PIDs. This last initiative is in progress and will require additional work to complete.
Nicole Tilford, SBL, Chair
James Ayers, New Mexico
Jennifer Bennett-Genther, SUNY
Jason Gosnell, Marine Corps
Sergiy Kozakov, Athabasca
Stephani Miller, Marine Corps
Ali Parrington, Princeton
Maia Rigas, Northwestern
Marthe Walters, Florida
Mary Young, Kent State
Tara Cyphers, Ohio State, Board Liaison
Trevor Nau, Central Office Liaison
Equity, Justice, Inclusion, and Belonging
The Equity, Justice, Inclusion, and Belonging (EJIB) Committee was committed throughout the 2024-2025 committee year to determining the interests and resource needs of the larger Association of University Presses membership and to providing opportunities for dialogue and resource sharing. They opened the year by conducting a survey of the members of all AUPresses committees and hosted a meeting with liaisons from these committees to determine the types of events and resources the EJIB committee should offer. The survey and meeting guided the committee’s goals and actions and inspired the re-emergence of a quarterly EJIB section in the AUPresses news bulletin, which features events, actions, and key resources that the membership should be aware of. The Committee also hosted three events throughout the year, the first focused on making accessibility accessible; the second focused on the state of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility initiatives in light of federal executive orders and actions restricting such initiatives; and the final event focused on employee retention, and included how Presses address mental health and neurodiversity in the context of retention.
Victoria-Lola Leon Guerrero, Guam, Chair
Milo Brooks, Florida
Kate Danser, Princeton
Craig Gill, Mississippi
Mary Lui, Toronto
Shalini Nanayakkara, British Columbia
Carah Naseem, Rutgers
Porsha Perry, Library of Congress
Yelba Quinn, Brookings
Walter Biggins, Pennsylvania, Board Liaison
Brenna McLaughlin, Central Office Liaison
Trevor Nau, Central Office Liaison
Faculty Outreach
This year, the Faculty Outreach Committee has continued to generate content for the AskUP site, recruiting a new group of hosts who have addressed questions about journal publishing, royalties, outside publicists, translation, and publication of creative writing, among other topics. Committee members also have reviewed older AskUP content to identify entries in need of updates and have begun drafting suggested changes. The committee organized and produced a slide deck that explains the process of publishing a journal article; the deck is now available for members to use or adapt for presentations. A glossary of publishing terms, developed by committee members over the past several years, is in the final stages of review and approval. The committee organized a panel on university press publishing at the 2025 Modern Language Association conference and, as a result of last year’s pitch letter to directors of graduate studies, organized a publishing panel for the University of Missouri in fall 2024, at the request of the assistant dean of professional development and leadership.. We also have had a panel accepted for the 2025 AUPresses Annual Meeting, on press relationships with their home universities. Plans are in progress with the Rutgers Center for Minority Serving Institutions to collaborate on four webinars in 2025-2026, designed to demystify the university press publishing process for interested faculty and graduate students.
Katie Cortese, Texas Tech, Co-Chair
Anne Savarese, Princeton, Co-Chair
Gregory Britton, Johns Hopkins
Emma Burridge, Liverpool
Amber Cederstrom, Wisconsin
Rebecca Colesworthy, SUNY
Shannon Fortner, Johns Hopkins
Kayowa Gibson-Tshilenge, Pennsylvania
Jennifer Keegan, LSU
Alec Loganbill, Kansas
Caroline McKusick, Stanford
Jane Bunker, Cornell, Board Liaison
Annette Windhorn, Central Office Liaison
Intellectual Property and Copyright
The Intellectual Property and Copyright (IP&C) Committee focused this year on creating programming around IP&C issues, particularly AI, and updating the Association’s IP&C resources on aupresses.org. We are currently scheduled to host a hangout on AI and Intellectual Property on May 8th. We are also preparing two sessions for the 2025 Annual Meeting in June, with one panel focused on leveraging subsidiary rights for revenue, and the other providing general education on author contracts and copyright. With regard to the aupresses.org IP&C resources, we are currently revising the extensive AUPresses Permissions FAQ, with a goal of completing our revisions by the end of the term year. We would also mention that, following outreach by the BISG Rights Committee, two IP&C Committee members attended BISG’s “Doing Rights Right” event in January, with one member participating on a panel. This may lead to future collaborations between the AUPresses and BISG rights groups.
Andrea Gapsch, Purdue, Co-Chair
Kerin Ogg, Duke, Co-Chair
Elizabeth Adams, Georgia
Susan Doerr, Minnesota
Alex Gupta, Pennsylvania
Jolie Hale, South Carolina
Joyce Harrison, Kansas
Taylor Sumereau, Princeton
Neal Swain, California
Clara Totten, Kent State
Stephanie Vyce, Harvard
Hilary Claggett, Georgetown, Board Liaison
Kate Kolendo, Central Office Liaison
Investment
The Investment Committee oversees the Association’s quasi-endowment fund, which is invested in a series of self-managed index funds. The current strategy seeks to maximize financial returns while ensuring compliance with the allocation guidelines outlined in the Association’s Investment Policy Statement. The Committee fulfills this role by reviewing monthly performance statements from Fidelity Investments, recommending portfolio rebalancing as needed, and advising the Board, upon request, on matters related to fund principal allocation and the strategic use of fund income, while maintaining a prudent reserve.
Paul Ashenfelter, Notre Dame, Chair
Mike Bieker, Arkansas
Teresa Collins, Kentucky
Kate Danser, Princeton
Dennis Lloyd, Wisconsin
Steve Mecham, Utah
Alexandria Leonard, Princeton, Board Liaison
Kim Miller, Central Office Liaison
Journals
The Journals Committee’s general objective is to develop and manage tools, programs, and resources to assist Association members in improving the activities of and promoting the public face of their journals programs. To this end, the Committee organized two panel sessions for the 2025 annual conference, worked to finalize a Journals Editor Onboarding Toolkit, and provided feedback on the Faculty Outreach Committee ‘How to Publish Your Journal Article’ slide deck. The Committee were specifically charged to undertake a journals survey to chart the current landscape and formed a survey project group to establish the purpose and structure of the survey. The Committee also supplied volunteers to assist the work of the EJIB and EDP Committees.
Ian Caswell, UCL, Co-Chair
Sarah McDonald, Edinburgh, Co-Chair
Faye DeBroux, Duke
Fern Ennis, Liverpool
Sally Hoffmann, Cambridge
Amanda Muscente, Catholic University
Jennifer Sacher, ASCSA
Tara Saunders, Purdue
Ann Snoeyenbos, Johns Hopkins
Wendy Queen, Johns Hopkins, Board Liaison
Kate Kolendo, Central Office Liaison
Library Relations
In the past year, the Library Relations Committee has worked towards meeting its core mission of facilitating a dialogue and knowledge sharing between the university press and academic library communities by organising conference sessions on the theme of collaboration that effects change. The two sessions intentionally reach both audiences: one at the 2025 AUPresses Annual Meeting and the other at the Library Publishing Forum 2025. We have also, through leads generated at the AUPresses collective booths at leading library conferences, begun to build a contact list of librarians to whom we can reach out directly and seek engagement with the committee and the wider AUPresses community. The long-term goal is to have this list, and the subsequent knowledge sharing, grow over the years and each iteration of the committee, making a lasting impact.
Jennie Collinson, Liverpool, Chair
Latrice Allen, Chicago
Maia Desjardins, Wilfred Laurier
Jessica Fiorillo, Harvard Education
Allison Levy, Brown
Alison Mero, Clemson
Kelsey Mrjoian, Michigan
Julia Oestreich, Delaware
Ann Snoeyenbos, Johns Hopkins
John Sherer, North Carolina, Board Liaison
Annette Windhorn, Central Office Liaison
Marketing
The Marketing Committee continued its Marketing Handbook revisions this year, with plans in place to update eight sections of the handbook in the Publicity, Ebooks, and Other Issues sections to reflect current best practices and tips, especially post-pandemic. The committee organized and hosted an April 2025 Hangout on “Leveraging Your Backlist.” The committee has also organized a Collaboration Lab at this year’s virtual AUPresses Annual Meeting on “Marketing Sensitive Topics” that will (as permitted by the Annual Meeting schedule) be followed by a more informal Zoom networking opportunity for AUPresses marketers.
Vanessa de Bueger, Amsterdam, Co-Chair
Stephanie Marchman, Notre Dame, Co-Chair
Rachel Doll, Florida
Lisa Kuerbis, Syracuse
Sarah Noell, Cornell
Michael Higgins, Harvard Education
Kristen Gregg, Cornell
Jamie Jones, Michigan
Alison Mailloux, Harvard
Laura Neilson, Liverpool
Peter Perez, North Carolina
Alisa Plant, LSU, Board Liaison
McKenzi Thi Murphy, Central Office Liaison
Open Access
The Open Access (OA) Committee has continued to support the Association’s members as they respond to changes in the publishing environment related to OA publishing. The main area of focus this year has been reimagining the Open Access Resource Guide to better serve AUPresses members, which as of April 2025 is taking shape nicely. The committee also proposed three sessions for the AUPresses virtual meeting; organized the accepted session, “Author Perspectives on Open Access”; and contributed to other OA sessions. The composition of the committee is international and we began planning actions to raise awareness about the global context for OA, to build a foundation for continued work in future years. Committee meetings also became an educational space as members discussed specific initiatives and organizations they’re involved in, such as Project MUSE’s Subscribe to Open, Path to Open’s Community Advisory Committee, Open Books Hong Kong, the Second Global Summit on Diamond OA, and the Adventures in Digital Publishing project, and heard from guest speakers Tom Grady (COPIM, Opening the Future) and Heather Joseph (SPARC).
Beth Fuget, Washington, Co-Chair
Phillip Hearn, Johns Hopkins, Co-Chair
Catherine Cocks, Syracuse
Stacy Lavin, North Carolina
James Moore, Duke
Justin Race, Purdue
BJ (“Bonnie”) Robinson, North Georgia
Sandra Shaw, Toronto
Wikus Van Zyl, UJ
Minlei Ye, CUHK
Erich van Rijn, California, Board Liaison
Brenna McLaughlin, Central Office Liaison
Professional Development
The Professional Development Committee (PDC) develops and manages tools, programs, and resources to assist Association members in improving their publishing expertise, developing their leadership skills, and enhancing their professional development and networks. The committee focused much of its work this year to continue helping members find ways to expand their professional networks and connect with colleagues. The PDC organized one hangout and one webinar: “Distributor Hangout” and “AUPresses Webinar: Building Global Audiences.”
The committee will also host two panels at the AUPresses Annual Meeting in June, “Balancing a Professional Life Outside Academic Publishing” and “Unsung Heroes: Mentoring in Publishing.” The committee continued the AUPresses Mentorship Program, matching this year’s mentors and mentees in advance of the Annual Meeting. Finally, the committee helped successfully launch and execute the Residency Program with six applicants completing residencies at member presses.
Alodie Larson, Oxford, Co-Chair
Kelly Fattman, Harvard Education, Co-Chair
Erik Beranek, Princeton
Rebecca Carhart, IVP
Andrea Gapsch, Purdue
Kim Hogeland, Oregon State
Julia Knecht, Wisconsin
Steven Rodriguez, Vanderbilt
Elisia Snyder, Alberta
Rachael Levay, Princeton, Board Liaison
Alexis Fagan, Central Office Liaison