iSchools Board of Directors Election Results

The iSchools Organization is pleased to announce the election of its new Board of Directors and Regional Chairs for 2026-2027. 

The Board plays an essential role in determining the strategic direction of the iSchools organization. It ensures that our mission, values, and activities reflect the interests of our members. The election for the iSchools Board of Directors began on 6 October 2025 and closed on 31 October 2025. All 119 voting representatives of the iSchools member institutions received a ballot. 69 voting representatives voted on the candidates.

We would like to welcome the following new iSchools Board of Directors members:

The new Chair-Elect will be Javed Mostafa (University of Toronto, Canada).

Ina Fourie (University of Pretoria, South Africa) will begin her term as iSchools Chair for 2026-2027. Gillian Oliver (Monash University, Australia) will move to the position of immediate Past Chair. Slava Sterzer serves as the iSchools Executive Director and is ex officio part of the iSchools Board of Directors with no voting right.

Regional Chairs

We are happy to welcome

as new iSchools Regional Chairs. Kinshuk (University of North Texas, USA) will represent the North American Region, Lihong Zhou (Wuhan University, China) will represent the Asia-Pacific Region and Laura Sbaffi (University of Sheffield, UK) will represent the European/African Region in the iSchools Board of Directors.

Treasurer

Tina Du (Charles Sturt University, Australia) will join the Board of Directors as newly elected iSchools Treasurer. The Treasurer is the only Board of Directors Member with an administrative function. In collaboration with the Executive Director, the Treasurer oversees the finances of the Organization and approves business expenses.

General Board of Directors Members

We would like to welcome for the North American Region:

Michelle Kazmer (Florida State University, USA), Colin Rhinesmith (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA) and Diana Daly (University of Arizona, USA) will get the 3 North American General Board of Directors Members seats.

After four succesful years as European/African Regional Chair Koraljka Golub (Linnaeus University, Sweden) stays in the iSchools Board as the new European/African General Board of Directors member.

The Asia Pacific Region will be represented by the two new iSchools General Board of Directors members Jun Deng (Jilin University, China) and Pengyi Zhang (Peking University, China)

All new iSchools Board of Directors members will start their term 1 January 2026 and their first Board of Directors meeting will take place during the iConference 2026.

The iSchools organization was founded two decades ago with roots dating back to the late 1980s. The iSchools educate thought-leaders of the future, and their researchers focus on enhancing the lives of people, the productivity of companies, the innovation cycles of industries, the design of technologies, the policies that govern technology and information use, information services to communities, and much more. The iSchools organization currently consists of more than 130 iSchools worldwide.