About us

The MIT Libraries’ Scholarly Communications & Collections Strategy (SCCS) department supports MIT faculty, students, and researchers with questions about their options and rights in the world of scholarly publishing, which has evolved dramatically with the advent of the digital age. We are guided by the values, principles, and aims expressed in the MIT faculty open access policy and the Institute-wide Task Force on the Future of Libraries.

SCCS makes collections decisions informed by strategy and values that explicitly incorporate transforming the processes of creating, disseminating, collecting, storing, managing, and preserving research inputs and outputs — often referred to with the shorthand “scholarly communications” — toward openness and increased access. The group takes the values of open access, diversity, equity, and social justice as a lens for framing collections decisions, and as important guideposts for navigating and favorably shaping the scholarly communications landscape.

We support open access publishing, initiatives, and infrastructure to help MIT authors and readers and researchers around the world. See Open Access Publishing Support for more information.

Our team

Eugenia Beh, Scholarly Communications & Licensing Librarian

Eugenia reviews library content license agreements and serves as the point person for working with vendors to expand access to licensed resources. She works on license terms negotiations for streaming media and/or other content format types that need focused attention to ensure terms of use are consistent with best practices and in alignment with Libraries’ goals.

Courtney Crummett, Collections Strategist for Science & Engineering and Research Data

Courtney is responsible for collection development and management in the subject areas of science and engineering as well as research data. Her collection stewardship activities contribute to MIT’s aim of a more open and equitable scholarly communication system. She can answer questions about collections in science, engineering, wellness, and research data.

Katharine Dunn, Scholarly Communications Librarian

Katharine supports faculty, researchers, and students with MIT’s open access policies and OA publishing agreements. She’s the main voice of the office’s X (Twitter) account, @MITLibScholarly. She can answer questions related to open access, copyright, author agreements, and research funder requirements.

Kevin Grant, Scholarly Communications Associate

Kevin supports implementation of MIT’s open access policies by assessing papers and depositing them to the OA collection of DSpace@MIT. He also manages requests for OA funds by MIT researchers.

Laura Hanscom, Department Head

Laura became department head in April 2021, after serving as interim head since March 2020. She leads MIT Libraries services and staff in transforming models of scholarly publishing to increase the impact and reach of research and scholarship and promote open, equitable, and sustainable publishing and access models. The SCCS head also coordinates overall collection management strategy for the Libraries’ general collections, as well as vendor negotiations and repository services.

Deborah Lenares, Senior Analyst and Strategist for Collections and Budget

Deborah oversees the building, shaping, and presenting of collections for the Libraries in support of the MIT community, and the values of MIT and the MIT Libraries. Deborah provides analysis and assessment of the Libraries’ collections. She can answer questions about collections in social sciences and management, and about collections assessment practices, including usage data.

Sadie Roosa, Collections Strategist for Repository Services

Sadie develops services and leads outreach related to our digital repositories, including MIT’s institutional repository DSpace@MIT, to maximize the access, discovery, usability, and sustainability of the Libraries’ repository-based scholarship and digital collections. She also facilitates the exploration of new methodologies and repository-based tools and services for the sharing of research results from all stages of the research life cycle and supporting machine learning/computational access to repository-based collections. She can answer questions about submitting content to or accessing content in MIT’s repositories.

Marcella Tam, Collections Strategist for HASSAP Tangibles

Marcella is responsible for collection development and management of the tangible collections and the subject areas of humanities, art, social sciences, architecture, and planning. Her work contributes to ensuring and stewarding appropriate access to MIT Libraries collections with a particular focus on developing an essential print core. She can answer questions about collection displays and also about collections in arts, architecture, humanities, and social sciences.

Katie Zimmerman, Director of Copyright Strategy

Katie helps the libraries and MIT patrons with copyright questions about publishing, digitization, and author copyrights. She also leads the Libraries’ licensing team, ensuring that ejournals and databases are available to the MIT community under terms for access and use that meet MIT’s needs. She can answer questions about copyright, author agreements, open access, and the Libraries’ license agreements.