Falls Church, VA — Digital Scholar, a leading nonprofit organization which builds and maintains critical open-source infrastructure for the digital humanities, is pleased to announce the appointment of Sheila A. Brennan as Director of Institutional Relations. With her extensive experience in humanities scholarship and strategic leadership, Dr. Brennan brings a wealth of experience and insight to the organization.

As DIR, Dr. Brennan will play a critical role in advancing Digital Scholar's mission to support and promote innovative digital scholarship initiatives by being the organization’s ambassador to stakeholders in higher education, libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural heritage organizations. She will be responsible for raising awareness about all of Digital Scholar’s offerings and for cultivating a network of collaborators in the effort to identify and support key free and open-source software (FOSS) projects in the humanities to ensure their sustainability.

Dr. Brennan brings two decades of experience in the field of digital humanities and digital scholarship. Dr. Brennan comes to DS from her role as Assistant Director of the Office of Data and Evaluation for the National Endowment for the Humanities. Previously, Dr. Brennan spent seven years as a Senior Program Officer in the Office of Digital Humanities where she ran grant programs supporting digital research and infrastructure. She also established joint funding opportunities with federal and international partners, and developed new resources to make the work of the NEH more legible to diverse constituents and stakeholders.

Prior to joining the NEH, Dr. Brennan held a number of leadership roles during her more than a dozen years at the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media at George Mason University. During that time she spearheaded over $13 million worth of grants and contracts for more than 20 digital humanities projects serving public historians, libraries, archives, museums, and members of the interested public globally. Key projects include the Doing DH Institutes, the award-winning Histories of the National Mall, the Hurricane Digital Memory Bank, Omeka, the Papers of the War Department Digital Edition & Scripto Crowdsourcing Transcription Tool, and the September 11th Digital Archive.

"Sheila brings to us her deep understanding of the digital humanities landscape," said Sean Takats, President of Digital Scholar. "Her proven track record in fostering collaboration between academic institutions and cultural heritage organizations makes her the ideal person to build bridges between Digital Scholar and its user communities. We're delighted Sheila's joining us, and we're looking forward to working with her to strengthen our connections with universities, libraries, archives, and museums worldwide."

“I am thrilled to be joining the team at Digital Scholar, a model organization that leads the field in implementing best practices and sustainable pathways for open source software," said Dr. Brennan. "In many ways, DH runs on DS. I look forward to sharing DS’s innovative and practical projects with wider networks. Personally, I look forward to collaborating once again with former colleagues who are talented, creative, and share a commitment to open-source infrastructure.”

About Digital Scholar:

Committed to the responsible stewardship of critical open-source infrastructure for the digital humanities, Digital Scholar was founded in 2009 to develop and operate the business models for Omeka and Zotero. Having secured their long-term sustainability and independence, Digital Scholar has since helped launch and sustain a growing family of software projects, including Tropy, PressForward, and Sourcery.