Kelly Jacobsma joined the college as a reference librarian in 1988 and served for 18 years as the library head of public services before assuming the role of library director in 2008. In 2015 she was promoted to the Genevra Thome Begg Dean of Libraries. She heads a library leadership team tasked with fulfilling the library’s mission to serve as a vibrant center of intellectual and cultural life that makes significant contributions to the education of Hope students.

AREAS OF INTEREST

Kelly has long held an interest in teaching with technology and how the library supports student learning in a digital age. She also acts as the de facto rare books librarian, responsible for working with donors and faculty on the value of rare books in student learning.

• Academic library administration – budgeting and staffing to best support student learning in a digital age
• Information literacy – how students find, evaluate and use information in the creation of new knowledge
• Collection development – the purchase of print and digital library materials
• Rare books – the integration of rare books and special collections into student learning
• Open Access – freely available access to peer reviewed articles and other educational resources
• Digital scholarship – applying new technologies to research and the archiving and publication of data and academic scholarship

EDUCATION

• MILS, University of Michigan, 1982
• B.A., Northern Michigan University, 1979

HONORS, GRANTS, AWARDS & PUBLISHED WORK

• Consortium on Digital Resources for Teaching and Research grant, Council of Independent Colleges, 2015–2018
• Arab American National Museum traveling exhibit on Arab Americans and religion, January 21–February 11, 2013
• State Librarian 2011 Citation of Excellence Award, Library of Michigan Foundation, October 27, 2011
• “Manifold Greatness: The Creation and Afterlife of the King James Bible,” traveling exhibition, NEH Small Grants to Libraries
• Council on Library and Information Resources grant, Scholarships for University of North Carolina’s Digital Curation Institute, 2009-2011
• Council of Independent Colleges Information Fluency in the Disciplines Workshop in Literature, 2010
• Awarded Council on Library and Information Resources Work Restructuring in Libraries Workshop scholarship grant, 2009–2010
• Appointed as the Genevra Thome Begg Endowed Director of Libraries, July 1, 2009
• Grant/gift of “100 Books for Understanding Contemporary Japan” by the Nippon Foundation, valued at $4,560, 2008–2009
• SBC Ameritech Partnership Award for Independent Colleges in support of “Information Literacy and Research Writing: A Joint Workshop of the English Department and Van Wylen Library,” co-project director, $10,000, 2001–2002
• Yntema Family Faculty Development Fund in support of “Teaching, Learning and Technology: Library Instruction in the College Curriculum,”  $2,500, 1998
• Michigan Council for the Humanities grant, “Scholarship for the People: Books and Libraries as a Culture for the Humanities,” project co-director, 1991–1992
• Lilly Endowment Grant, Deputy Director for Library Component, 1989–1990

Outside Hope

Kelly and her husband live in a 140-plus-year-old farm house outside of the quaint Village of Douglas and are proud that their daughter is a 2016 college graduate.