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Meet the Dean

BY ANNIE HUBBELL

Starting a new job can be stressful, but add a global pandemic and it can become overwhelming. Tracy Elliott, Ph.D., took this experience in stride. Her first day as dean of the University Library at Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) was March 23, 2020, just as campus cleared to begin online instruction due to COVID-19.

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Her early months were filled with Zoom meetings and introductions but the pandemic allowed Elliott to focus on communication with her library staff. The experience helped reinforce an important belief: Libraries must be flexible and adapt to change. Those two things ensure a library remains relevant, particularly in an era that relies on the virtual space to share information electronically.

“Everything I do is focused on helping the people who work in the library be successful,” Elliott said. “I want people to know these experts exist and what they are able to provide them. It’s our role to make sure that the university is academically successful.”

Elliott came from California, where she served as dean of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library at San José State University. Before that, Elliott was the director of libraries at the State College of Florida and head librarian at St. Petersburg College. She has also held positions at Rappahannock Community College, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Columbus State University and Auburn University. But, as a Florida native, she is happy to be back in her home state.

“I have always kept my eye on FGCU. I knew this was a university where I could come in and take the library forward with the changes that are happening in higher education. I felt like this was a great match for me.” Elliott said.

Her focus is on the library supporting scholarship while connecting students with research to make the library relevant in their day-to-day studies.

She’s working on making the library more technologically savvy. It’s switching to a new cloud-based system called Alma, which will align FGCU with the other 11 public universities in Florida, allowing for high-level learning with the option to collaborate with the other institutions.

“It helps us support the amazing programs coming out of FGCU, like The Water School and the Daveler & Kauanui School of Entrepreneurship,” Elliott said. “In order for them to be successful, they need a robust library that supports their academic work.”

Elliott also envisions the library as a campus hub, attracting students of all disciplines, with hands-on learning tools for students such as virtual and augmented reality labs, digital prototyping and media production.

The library is the heart of multidisciplinary work at any university, and students can enjoy that serendipity of multidisciplinary interaction. All of those types of technologies help students learn and produce scholarship in new ways.”

– Tracy Elliott, Dean of the

University Library at Florida

Gulf Coast University

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