[Ottawa, ON]
CANARIE, a vital component of Canada’s digital infrastructure supporting research, education and innovation, and Research Data Canada, today announced the appointment of Mark Leggott as Executive Director of Research Data Canada (RDC).
RDC is an organization dedicated to supporting Canadian innovation by improving the management of research data. RDC’s role is to bring together key stakeholders to develop strategy, facilitate communication and partnerships, promote education and training, measure progress, and bring attention to gaps. RDC also acts as single point of contact for Canada with international initiatives, ensuring engagement with appropriate stakeholders. Created in 2011, Research Data Canada’s activities have been supported by CANARIE since 2014.
As Executive Director, Mark will build on the existing progress of RDC and facilitate broad stakeholder outreach to launch programs that strengthen Canada’s research data management capacity. Under Mark’s leadership, RDC will move forward with programs that ensure data management solutions evolve in concert with other elements of Canada’s digital research infrastructure.
Before joining CANARIE, Mark enjoyed a successful academic career, most recently as the University Librarian at the University of Prince Edward Island. Mark sat on the Tri-Agencies’ Data Management Policy Advisory Committee, and has also contributed to CANARIE’s Software Technical Advisory Committee and Federated Single Sign-On Committee. Mark brings business acumen and technical savvy to his considerable knowledge of the research data management ecosystem as the founder of the Islandora project, an open source digital asset management system.
Pam Bjornson, Chair of Research Data Canada welcomed Mark’s appointment. “Mark’s long history of leadership in research data management will be invaluable in advancing the goals of Research Data Canada. He is widely known and well positioned to bring the research communities together to jointly address data stewardship in Canada.” Pam also paid tribute to CANARIE, “Once again, we thank CANARIE for its vision and its support. With a full-time Executive Director, RDC is positioned more strongly than ever to realize its mission. CANARIE’s support is critical.”
“We are delighted that Mark is on board to help Canada fully maximize the value of research data,” says Jim Ghadbane, President and CEO of CANARIE. “His leadership, at a time when data management policies are evolving, will help ensure researchers are aware of the changing data management landscape and have the information and tools to take advantage of the opportunities it presents. I would also like to extend our thanks to Pam Bjornson and the members of the RDC Steering Committee, who took the lead on this issue and will continue to advance the stewardship of research data in Canada.”
“I am delighted to join Research Data Canada and CANARIE and for the opportunity to contribute to strengthening the research data management ecosystem in Canada,” says Mark Leggott. “We have a tremendous opportunity to leverage open data and catalyze a new wave of knowledge, scientific discovery and innovation and I look forward to contributing to this effort.”
Mark’s new role as Executive Director of RDC will begin on February 8, 2016.
For more information:
Ela Ienzi
Communications Manager
CANARIE
(613) 943-5432
[email protected]