AU President to head Canadian Association of Learned Journals

June 13, 2011

Dr. Frits Pannekoek, president of Athabasca University, has been acclaimed president-elect of the Canadian Association of Learned Journals (CALJ) at its recent Congress 2011. Dr. Pannekoek will serve as president-elect for one year and then assume the presidency of the organization for two years.

"We are delighted that Dr. Pannekoek has agreed to serve with CALJ-ACRS at this time of rapid and substantial change in the scholarly journals publishing arena," says CALJ Executive Director Dr. Ellen Henderson. "It is a testament to our shared conviction that ensuring the long-term health of Canadian scholarly journals is vital to effective dissemination of research from Canada's scholars and universities."

Dr. Pannekoek is responsible for establishing Athabasca University Press, dedicated to making academic publications available to scholars, students and the general public online and free of charge.

"It's an exciting time to be taking on this new role," says Dr. Pannekoek. "Academic journals are undergoing a period of rapid change, including digitization, and I'm looking forward to helping the community through that process."

"The CALJ's strategy is growth through collaboration," says Dr. Richard Smith, president of the CALJ. " In particular, a Canadian journals consortium to enable national aggregation of social science and humanities scholarship and to negotiate a national site licence."
The Canadian Association of Learned Journals is a not-for-profit, member-driven organization representing an increasing number of Canadian scholarly journals from various disciplines in the humanities, social sciences and sciences.

In addition to serving as president of Athabasca University, Dr. Pannekoek is also president of the International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE), a UNESCO-sanctioned world body based in Oslo, Norway.

For more Information, contact:

John O'Brien
Manager, Media Relations
(403) 298-2931
jobrien@athabascau.ca

 

< back to news

Updated August 21, 2012