NORTHAMPTON — Susan Fliss — a veteran librarian of Harvard University, Dartmouth College and Mount Holyoke College — has been named dean of libraries at Smith College.
Fliss will begin her work at Smith on Sept. 1. She will succeed Chris Loring, who recently retired after 16 years as the college’s director of libraries.
Fliss now is an associate university librarian for research, teaching and learning at Harvard Library, and director and librarian of the Monroe C. Gutman Library at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Her appointment coincides with a massive renovation of the college’s Neilson Library, spearheaded by architectural designer Maya Lin and Shepley Bulfinch, a prominent architecture firm. Fliss will oversee the new developments and manage a staff of 54.
Katherine Rowe, provost and dean of faculty at Smith, lauded Fliss’ experience and passion.
“Susan Fliss emerged from a very competitive national search as the top candidate,” Rowe said. “We are delighted that she is bringing her creative talents at such a propitious moment for the college.”
Fliss spent the first part of her career in libraries at her alma mater, Mount Holyoke College, where she worked for 12 years as a reference librarian. There, Fliss experienced the union of libraries and information technology and the advent of the internet — all of which transformed how libraries serve their patrons.
“The merge of IT and the library was a wonderful learning experience because at that time we didn’t work as much together,” Fliss said. “We had to learn one another’s language, where our work intersected, how we needed to be aware and familiar with what each of us did.”
Advances in technology have forced libraries to evolve and expand, Fliss said. Accessing information no longer demands physical presence in a building. Instead, information and pieces of history can be shared with anyone, anywhere, via digitization.
“Libraries are digitizing their special collections and making them available over the internet to the world,” Fliss said. “Anyone who has internet access can look at the historical diaries, medieval manuscripts and peruse the pages of the past.”
As she works to guide Smith in its own library evolution, Fliss hopes to make it the campus’ anchor.
“I think it’s an exciting time for Smith in re-envisioning the library and putting it at the center of the campus, both as a teaching and learning center for the community and thinking about how people are going to be working at libraries in the future,” Fliss said.
Despite witnessing the metamorphosis of libraries, Fliss’ said the most enjoyable part of the work has stayed consistent.
“My favorite part when I was a younger librarian was helping people find the information they needed and then watching their reactions,” Fliss said. “I loved when you could see that lightbulb go off, when they were taking the information and building their own knowledge.”