Los Angeles, CA -- June 29, 2023. Carlo Medina, who began his career in the campus library system nearly 30 years ago, has been named director of the University of California Southern Regional Library Facility (SRLF) and UCLA Library Unified Access Services, effective July 1. The appointment was made by Ginny Steel, the Norman and Armena Powell University Librarian.
Medina is currently the director of library access services, where he provides leadership and organizational vision for a department that operates across eight UCLA Library locations that encompass 30 staff and more than 100 student employees. He is also one of two library equity, diversity and inclusion advisors focused on strategy, policy, training and accountability.
"Carlo's experience working across multiple library levels and on UC-wide projects makes him uniquely prepared for this dual role leading the management and operations of two interconnected departments in the UCLA and UC Library systems," Steel said. "His demonstrated commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion, which is central to the library's core values, will help ensure broad accessibility to information and materials, and his experience with planning for systemwide initiatives gives him a great foundation for his work at SRLF."
The Southern Regional Library Facility was established in 1987 on the northwest side of UCLA as an off-site repository and retrieval facility holding 7 million items from all 10 UC campuses including books, serials, atlases, microfilm, A/V materials, maps, and rare and unique special collections. It also includes an imaging services unit, which helped accelerate campus-based remote lending services during the pandemic.
Unified Access Services is a campus-based library department providing patron registration, shelving and stacks maintenance, building maintenance and library safety and security monitoring. Services that overlap with SRLF include access workflow, interlibrary loans, circulation services and course reserves.
"It is a tremendous honor to have been selected to manage and lead two organizations devoted to the provision of research materials to the academic community and public at large," said Medina, who earned a bachelor's degree from UCLA in 1996. "This position brings together many of the services, responsibilities, opportunities and challenges that make the UCLA Library an exciting place to work and cements the UC Library as one of the preeminent repositories of printed knowledge."
In this newly created role, he will provide strategic vision and leadership to both areas, including significant involvement in future-planning, development and deployment of policies, services and programs and general operations. As an alumnus who first worked in the library as a student, Medina's entire career has been dedicated to serving academic scholarship and research, and he will continue to help the library system transform to best support user access.
He joined the library in 1996, became a manager in 2006 — and was appointed in 2010 to direct access services and interlibrary loans for the Charles E. Young Research Library. In 2016, he was named director of unified access services, where he brought together all access services units into one. As implementation coordinator the past two years for a UC-wide library services platform project, he helped UCLA transition to the new system.
Medina is a founding member of the California Libraries Access Services South, which serves access services practitioners from academic libraries throughout Southern California. He will continue in his role as a library equity advisor.
About UCLA Library
Consistently ranked among the top academic libraries in the country, UCLA Library drives the world-class research, groundbreaking discoveries and innovation for which UCLA is renowned. Whether across its 12 campus locations, UCLA Film and Television Archives division, or online, the Library takes the lead in preserving cultural heritage, making knowledge accessible and building a library of the future. Under the direction of Norman and Armena Powell University Librarian Ginny Steel, the UCLA Library system serves students, faculty and researchers of all disciplines. Visit library.ucla.edu for access to resources, collections and services.