This past summer, Dr. Jennifer L. Jenkins joined CRL in the role of part-time Communications and Membership Coordinator; on November 1, she transitioned into the full-time position of CRL’s Head of Membership Engagement and Communications. In this expanded role, Jen will engage with and better get to know colleagues at CRL member institutions, which will inform how CRL articulates and communicates the benefits of CRL membership for our member institutions. She will also serve as the staff liaison to the CRL Governance Task Force, a Board-appointed body currently working to update CRL’s mission, vision, and values statement and modernize CRL’s governance structures.
Jen comes to CRL from academia, and more recently, from the non-profit learned society world. She’s excited to note that all of the institutions of higher learning at which she studied and pursued dissertation and archival research in the U.S. are CRL members: Miami University (Oxford, OH) for her BA, the University of Wisconsin–Madison for her MA and PhD degrees, and Yale University, where she has twice been awarded research fellowships (in 2016 and 2024) at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Jen also spent a year as a visiting instructor at another CRL member institution, the College of William and Mary in Virginia. Jen received tenure at Pacific Lutheran University, a private liberal arts college in Tacoma, Washington, where she taught a broad range of courses in the German, Nordic Studies, International Honors, and First-Year Experience programs. During Jen’s sabbatical year in 2016–17, her first archival experience consulting materials in the Hermann Broch archive at the Beinecke resulted in her discovery of three previously unknown texts by the Austrian author Hermann Broch, on which she has produced commentated editions and scholarly articles; the published results of her archival work were recognized with a Faculty Excellence Award in Research. While at PLU, Jen also gained experience with institutional strategic planning and crafting mission-driven vision statements as a member and then Faculty Vice Chair of the University Long-Range Planning Committee, and looks forward to incorporating this experience in CRL’s upcoming strategic visioning process
In 2022, Jen became Operations Director of the German Studies Association, in which role she was the first point of contact for GSA members, managed the association’s social media accounts and other member communications such as the quarterly newsletter, and assisted with the organization of the annual conference. Beginning in 2023, Jen also worked on an interim consulting basis for the American Council of Learned Societies (of which both the GSA and CRL are members). It was in this context working with executive directors of ACLS learned societies and affiliates that Jen became familiar with CRL, as CRL is an affiliate ACLS member.
Jen looks forward to engaging with the CRL community in new and creative ways, to ensure that CRL members are connected to CRL and taking advantage of the possibilities CRL provides for inspired research and teaching.
