Essex Librarian named as Jisc Community Champion 2024

Hannah Crago, Open Research Development Librarian, has been named as one of the Jisc Community Champions for 2024.

Jisc’s community champions programme shines a light on individuals and teams that go above and beyond to bring their communities together on topics including assistive technology, artificial intelligence, libraries, digital transformation, research and more.

Hannah Crago is the Open Research Development Librarian at the University of Essex, where she leads the Research Services team. 

Hannah promotes open research practices across the university, as well as providing training for researchers on publishing, research visibility, and copyright. Hannah also manages the institutional open access fund, and advocates for alternative models of open access publication.

Hannah said of the award: “Being recognised as one of Jisc’s community champions for my work on open access is a real privilege. So much of the work that myself and everyone working on open research does is based around the strength of communities, so it’s a great thing to be celebrating.”

Director of Library and Cultural Services and University Librarian, Jonathan White, said: “I am delighted that Hannah’s contributions to the development of open research have been recognised with this award.”

“Hannah has led the Library's open research services to make impact across both education and research here at Essex and she has built a strong external profile and reputation across the sector. Her conference speaking, publications and participation in international working groups and projects are highly respected, and this award recognises those achievements.”

An active Jisc community member, Hannah regularly presents at Jisc webinars and events and is a regular contributor to Jisc articles. 

Hannah has been recognised for being an advocate of Open Access, a supporter of early career researchers and pushing for the community to learn from the experiences of other HEIs.

Scholarly Communications and Engagement Officer at Jisc, Anna Hughes, said on nominating Hannah for the award: “Hannah is a passionate advocate for open access, going above and beyond her role, both at Essex and within the wider scholarly communications community.”

“She is forward thinking, regularly making the argument to support alternative models of OA monograph publishing at Essex to increase equity and encourage open research practices, particularly amongst early career researchers via the Essex Student Journal and a new institutional open access fund, which aims to ensure all Essex-authored research outputs can be read by as wide an audience as possible.”