The University of Kansas (KU) has named Carol E. Smith dean of the KU Libraries, effective July 3, 2023.
Smith currently serves as university librarian at Colorado School of Mines. Smith’s guiding principle in her leadership at Mines has been her dedication to libraries improving society by facilitating knowledge creation. She comprehensively reorganized the Colorado School of Mines library and museum in direct support of strategic goals. She established the Scholars Hub, a center for scholarly communications and open initiatives, and created a new engagement librarian role responsible for student outreach and robust curricular and co-curricular programming, including book discussions, workshops, and more. She recruited new leadership that turned a static campus museum into a top regional family attraction with a K–12 outreach program.
Prior to her service at Colorado School of Mines, Smith was library director at Adams State University in Alamosa, Colorado. She previously served as a tenured associate professor of library services at the University of Central Missouri, where she was the business librarian and technology initiatives librarian. Librarianship was a mid-career change for Smith, who spent time in leadership positions in both the oil industry and the information services profession until 2004.
Smith holds a graduate certificate in geographic information systems from the University of Central Missouri as well as a master’s degree in information systems and a master’s degree in library and information science, both from Drexel University. She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and Arabic from Binghamton University.
At KU, Carol Smith will succeed Kevin Smith, who stepped down in July 2022 after leading the KU Libraries for six years. Scott Hanrath and Beth Whittaker have been serving as interim co-deans since July 2022.
For more information about this transition, see the KU Libraries news release “Carol Smith Selected as Next Dean of KU Libraries.”
