Contacts

Willow completed a Masters of Information Studies from the University of Toronto in 2008, and spent a year working as a Reference and Instruction Librarian at the University of Northern British Columbia. She has a BA in Psychology from Simon Fraser University, and has worked as a Research Assistant in a number of higher education institutions.

Willow moved from Canada to Nottingham in October 2009. She enjoys travel, running, knitting and reading.

Bill Hubbard is the Head of the Centre for Research Communications (CRC), incorporating the work of SHERPA. Bill has a background in innovative developments of ICT in higher education and research and associated change management; in particular in work aiming to embed ICT into university functions and working practices. Previous work has been in the use of Expert Systems to support decision making, designing information systems for managing research funding and a number of years working with the introduction of multimedia into university teaching and learning. Bill's commercial experience includes three years as a unit head, managing projects in virtual reality applications for communications, installations and broadcast, specialising in virtual heritage environments. Before this he worked as a senior lecturer at De Montfort University, Leicester, leading a BA degree course in Multimedia Design and has been an honorary lecturer in the School of Computing Sciences at the University of East Anglia.

Bill speaks widely on innovation in communication and research, including open access and related issues - repository network development, institutional integration, cultural change, IPR and policy development. He is also involved in archaeological and heritage applications of new media and sits on the Channel 4 Award jury for new media archaeology.

More on Bill's personal web page >>

Azhar is the CRC Open Access Services Co-ordinator, based at the University of Nottingham. Prior to joining CRC Azhar has held a variety of positions in Higher Education and the NHS ranging from roles as Project Manager to Operations Manager. Azhar has extensive experience in the field of institutional research repositories and academic research processes and was previously Project Manager responsible for the development of an Open Access Research Repository for the University of Salford.

Azhar has a degree in Consumer Law and postgraduate qualifications in Information Science and Project Management.

Outside work, Azhar likes reading and has a keen interest in the field of Open Access, Digital Libraries and Open Source Learning Technologies.

Peter Millington gained a BSc in Information Science from Leeds Polytechnic, and went on to run the technical library and information unit for the Central Electricity Generating Board, Midlands Region - now E.On. This role also included managing the publication of internal scientfic reports. He later moved to Fisons Pharmaceuticals, Loughborough - later AstraZeneca R&D Charnwood - to develop bibliographic and chemical databases to help expedite the drug discovery process.

On leaving AstraZeneca, Peter completed a PhD on traditional drama at the University of Sheffield, so he has first hand experience of the needs of practitioners in both science & technology, and the arts & humanities.

Stephen Pinfield is Chief Information Officer at the University of Nottingham, UK, where he has responsibility for a converged IT and library service. He has been active for a number of years in the areas of open access, open data and open educational resources. He speaks and publishes widely on these and related subjects.

Stephen is the company Chair of EMMAN (East Midlands Metropolitan Area Network) Ltd which manages the academic network for the UK East Midlands region. He is also currently on the JANET 6 (next-generation UK network) Advisory Group.

Stephen has a degree in History from the University of Cambridge, and a Master's degree from University College London in Library and Information Studies. He has a PhD from Nottingham University Business School on open-access publishing and dissemination.

More on Stephen's personal web page >>

Nancy Pontika joined the CRC team in January 2012 to work on the Repository Support Project. Nancy has a thorough background in Open Access information, having worked as an Assistant Editor and Project Manager with the Open Access Directory. Previous to this, Nancy worked as a library director in Athens for the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy

Nancy has taught on courses for information professionals, as well as providing workshops and one-to-one consultancy services. Nancy recently gained a PhD in Information Science with a specialism in Open Access and the effects of public access policies, from Simmons College, Boston MA.

Jane H Smith is the Services Development Officer of SHERPA, based at the University of Nottingham. She has previously been employed as an Information Scientist with a leading biomedical charity, where she worked on a busy science enquiry service. In this role Jane represented her employers at meetings for the Consortium of Independent Health Information Libraries in London (CHILL). Jane is a Chartered member of CILIP.

Prior to employment, Jane studied Immunology at University of Edinburgh, followed by Electronic Information Management at Robert Gordon University.

Jane enjoys both film and digital photography, and crafting.

Jackie moved to the CRC after several years as Service Manager for Intute: health and life sciences, a national service providing access to quality internet resources for the higher and further education communities.

Prior to this, she was Head of Health Information for NHS Direct, the multi-channel health advice and information service after a long career in providing information services to patients and the public.

She has a degree in History from the University of Hull and a Master in Library and Information Studies from Loughborough University.

Laurian Williamson joined the Centre for Research Communications (CRC) team in May 2011 to work on the Repositories Support Project (RSP). Laurian previously worked as the Service Co-ordinator for the national academic information service Intute: Health and Life Sciences which was located at the University of Nottingham.

Laurian has previously worked in both academic and public libraries and as a project officer for the JISC funded projects OMNI (Organising Medical Networked Information) and BIOME. Laurian is the author of three (microbiology, veterinary medicine, and dentistry & oral health) of the Virtual Training Suite free Internet tutorials which aim to help university students to develop Internet research skills to assist with their university coursework and assignments.

Laurian has a degree in psychology from the University of Natal (Durban) and is currently studying towards an MSc in Library and Information Studies (as a distant learner) at Robert Gordon University.