Penn names Dean from Stony Brook U. Constantia Constantinou as new Vice Provost of Libraries

Penn will appoint Constantia Constantinou, the current Dean of University Libraries at Stony Brook University, as the new H. Carton Rogers III Vice Provost and Director of the Penn Libraries. In an email to administrators, Provost Wendell Pritchett said that Constantinou will begin her job on August 1. 

The announcement comes several months after the current Vice Provost and Director of Libraries Carton Rogers announced his retirement in Oct. 2017. Rogers, who has been working for Penn Libraries since 1975, will retire in June.

The University announced in January that it had created a special committee consisting of Penn faculty, staff members and students to find and appoint a new Director of Libraries. Constantinou's appointment is one of four major administrative announcements from Penn's top leaders this year. 

In early February, Penn announced that John L. Jackson, Jr. of Penn's School of Social Policy and Practice would be named the new Dean for the Annenberg School for Communication. Less than three weeks later, President Amy Gutmann and Pritchett named Tufts University professor Andrew Hoffman as the new Dean for Penn's School of Veterinary Medicine. And in March, the University named Mark Wolff, a professor and the chair of cariology and comprehensive care at the College of Dentistry at New York University, as the new Dean for Penn Dental. 

More recently, the University announced plans to create new administrative positions, including a Chief Wellness Officer, who will oversee a new department at Penn called "Student Wellness Services," and a new Executive Director for a consolidated "Penn First Plus" officer.  

Constantinou has worked in numerous University libraries in the past, including libraries at the City University of New York, Rutgers University and Iona College. Most recently, she served for the past five years as Dean of University Libraries and as SUNY Distinguished Librarian at SUNY Stony Brook.

In the emailed announcement, Pritchett emphasized Constantinou’s strong record of embracing technology in her past university library leadership roles.

“She has been a pioneer throughout her career in developing digital, multimedia, and technology initiatives in large university library systems,” Pritchett said. 

When Rogers was appointed as the director of libraries in 2004, Penn President Amy Gutmann similarly highlighted Rogers' achievements in technological innovation while he served as the director of information processing, in a statement to the press.

The vice provost and director of libraries is one of the six vice provosts who work under Pritchett; the others being the vice provosts for faculty, education, global initiatives, research, and University life.