Dublin, OH -- 13 November 2023. Ginny Steel, the Norman and Armena Powell University Librarian, University of California, Los Angeles, has been elected Chair, and Tim Robinson, Chief Executive Officer of Nationwide Children's Hospital, took his seat on the OCLC Board of Trustees today during the Board's November meeting.
Steel takes over for John Szabo, City Librarian, Los Angeles Public Library, who has served as Chair since 2017. Szabo will continue to serve on the Board; his current term runs through 2026.
There are nine librarians from four countries currently serving on the 15-member OCLC Board of Trustees.
Ginny Steel has spent her career focused on understanding the information needs of faculty, students, and staff, advocating for sustainable scholarly communications practices, and enhancing and building services and collections.
Prior to moving to UCLA in 2013, Steel served as the University Librarian at UC Santa Cruz, Director of Libraries at Washington State University, Associate Director for Public Services at MIT, and in various positions at UC San Diego and Arizona State University.
Steel was president of the Library Administration and Management Association in 2004-2005 and has chaired a number of boards, councils, and committees including the OCLC Global Council, the Center for Research Libraries Board, the SPARC Steering Committee, and the Advocacy and Public Policy Committee of the Association for Research Libraries. In addition, she has served on the HathiTrust Board and the Greater Western Library Alliance Board.
Steel was elected to the Board of Trustees by OCLC's Global Council in May 2018.
Tim Robinson is the Chief Executive Officer of Nationwide Children's Hospital, based in Columbus, Ohio. He first joined Nationwide Children's in 1995 and has helped the hospital transform from an important regional children's health care system into a preeminent academic medical center. Nationwide Children's now appears annually on the U.S. News & World Report list of top ten children's hospitals, and it is one of the National Institutes of Health's top funded freestanding pediatric research facilities.
In his 28 years with Nationwide Children's, Robinson has held the titles of Assistant Treasurer, Senior Vice President, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial and Administrative Officer. During his tenure as Chief Financial Officer, Robinson led groundbreaking efforts in population health. Partners For Kids, now one of the country's oldest and largest pediatric accountable care organizations, has grown from responsibility for 13,000 children to approximately 460,000 children under his leadership.
Robinson serves on the Nationwide Children's Hospital Board and a number of hospital subsidiary boards. He currently serves as Board Chair of the Ohio Children's Hospital Association, as well as Board Chair of Andelyn Bioscience and is on the Board of Children's Hospital Association, and its public policy committee. He is also on the board of Rev1 Ventures, Columbus Partnership, and the Downtown Development Corporation.
Robinson earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Indiana University, where he double majored in Psychology and Business Administration.
He was elected by the Board to take the seat of Cindy Hilsheimer, Managing Principal, BeecherHill, who is retiring from the Board after serving since 2011.
The OCLC Board of Trustees guides the vision of OCLC, shaping its strategy and goals. The Board also fulfills the fiduciary duty of protecting OCLC's shared assets and investments. In addition, the Board is responsible for recruiting and working with the OCLC President and CEO, and for monitoring the organization through a dedicated audit process.
About OCLC
OCLC is a nonprofit global library organization that provides shared technology services, original research, and community programs so that libraries can better fuel learning, research, and innovation. Through OCLC, member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat, the most comprehensive global network of data about library collections and services. Libraries gain efficiencies through OCLC's WorldShare, a complete set of library management applications and services built on an open, cloud-based platform. It is through collaboration and sharing of the world's collected knowledge that libraries can help people find answers they need to solve problems. Together as OCLC, member libraries, staff, and partners make breakthroughs possible.