Webinar – Subscribe to Open: Advancing Sustainable OA in the Biosciences Community

Robin N Sinn is Interim Associate University Librarian at Iowa State University, University Library. Usually, she is Director of Collections and Open Strategies there. Moving academic publishing to an open model is a goal of both roles. Robin obtained her MS in librarianship from Drexel University. She previously worked at the Academy of Natural Sciences Academy Library, University of Toledo Carlson Library, Bowling Green State University Libraries, and Johns Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries.

Jill Emery is the collection development and management librarian at Portland State University Library and has over 30 years of academic library experience. At Portland State University, she has served as Presiding Officer of the Faculty Senate and co-chaired the Faculty Senate Budget Committee. She has held leadership positions in ALA ALCTS (precursor to ALA CORE), ER&L, and NASIG. She currently serves on the COUNTERmetrics Executive Committee. Jill is the publications officer for Insights: the UKSG journal along with being a senior editor for Katina: Librarianship Elevated. Her co-authored book is Techniques of Electronic Resource Management: TERMS and the Transition to Open.

Lucy Kerhoulas grew up in northern California (USA) and went to Cal Poly Humboldt in Arcata, CA for her BS in Botany. She then got an MS in redwood tree physiology from Cal Poly Humboldt and then a PhD in ponderosa pine ecophysiology from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, AZ. She is now an Associate Professor in Forest Ecophysiology at Cal Poly Humboldt. Her research includes canopy ecology, tree rings, physiological measurements, and stable isotopes. Since 2023, she has worked as the Chief Editor for Northwest Science, a regional scientific society journal. In her spare time, she enjoys hanging out with her family; three daughters keep her busy!

Ben van Ee is a plant taxonomist specializing on the genus Croton (Euphorbiaceae), and with additional interests in conservation, citizen science, and education, among others. He is the director of the MAPR herbarium, Professor of Biology, and head of the Department of Biology of the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez. He previously taught at Black Hills State University in Spearfish, South Dakota. His first involvement in publishing was a brief stint (2009-2015) as an Associate Editor of Phytotaxa. Subsequently, he has served as Associate Editor of Systematic Botany, and currently serves as one of two Managing Editors for the journal. Since 2019 he has been editor and publisher of the Caribbean Journal of Science.

Taran Grant is Full Professor at the University of São Paulo (USP) in the Departament of Zoology of the Institute of Biosciences and Associate Curator of Amphibians in the Museum of Zoology. He is Canadian but has lived abroad since 1994 when he moved to Colombia to pursue his undergraduate degree at the Universidad del Valle, in Cali. In 1998, he was awarded a joint fellowship from the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and Center for Environmental Research and Conservation to pursue graduate studies in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Columbia University. He completed his PhD in 2005 and received a post-doctoral fellowship in computational biology at AMNH. In 2007, he joined the faculty of the Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil and then moved to USP is 2011. In collaboration with students and colleagues, he studies the evolution of ampiliabi diversity from a variety of perspectives, from the theory and practice of phylogenetic inference to toad migration, the invasion biology of the American bullfrog in Brazil, and the evolution of chemical defense. Since 2013, he has been Senior Editor/Editor-in-Chief of the South American Journal of Herpetology, published by the Brazilian Society of Herpetology.

Christine Orr serves as BioOne’s Senior Director of Business and Community Development, driving strategic initiatives designed to advance the mission of sustainably maximizing access to research. Her portfolio includes leading efforts to achieve revenue targets, driving corporate communications and raising the profile of BioOne among strategic communities, and supporting organizational transformation via the creation of Open Access pathways and product diversification. With more than three decades of experience working across mission-driven and for-profit organizations, Christine has deep connections in the scholarly publishing and library communities. She has held sales and marketing roles at Ringgold, the American Institute of Physics, and OSA – the Optical Society.

Meredith joined BioOne as Publisher and Partnerships Manager in 2023. She brings 15 years of experience in academic publishing with a focus on society partnerships, editorial development, and open access. At BioOne, she oversees initiatives such as the Subscribe to Open pilot, Ambassador Awards program, and Publisher Advisory Group, while also contributing to platform strategy and developing tools and services designed to support independent society publishers. Beyond her role at BioOne, Meredith supports the scholarly publishing community through her volunteer work with the Society for Scholarly Publishing’s Generations Fund and participates in cross-industry conversations on equitable open access, society publishing, and platform futures. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Literature from UCSB, and lives in Southern California.