By Johan Nilsson, Chairperson, Dryad Board of Directors

As Chair of the Dryad Board of Directors, it is exciting to see how much Dryad has grown over the past 10 years to a truly international and impactful organization. Year on year, we continue to curate and publish more datasets than years prior, and we’ve expanded our Dryad community bringing on institutions, funders, and publishers globally. This growth signifies the importance of data publishing and Dryad remains committed to building strong partnerships with publishers, institutions, and researchers. 

We are very much looking forward to bringing on our next Executive Director to drive Dryad’s continued success and are delighted by the many strong candidates that have already come forward. In the meantime, Dryad’s Board of Directors is pleased to announce that Patricia (Trisha) Cruse has accepted an appointment to the position of Interim Executive Director. Trisha brings with her many years of experience in data sharing, libraries, and non-profit organizations, including serving as Executive Director of DataCite. Most recently Trisha has worked with the Dryad team on membership strategies and outreach. With her unique perspective and expertise, Trisha is ideally positioned to lead Dryad during this transitional period. 

In her role as Interim Executive Director, Trisha will continue to sustain and move Dryad forward and is committed to the vision of supporting researchers in data publishing and data reuse. We are confident that Trisha’s experiences will allow her to successfully lead Dryad during this phase, working closely with the Dryad Board of Directors and team as we choose our next Executive Director.

As we prepare for the future of Dryad, we would like to extend our thanks to Tracy Teal for her leadership this past year. We are looking forward to this next chapter at Dryad, and we will continue to keep the community apprised as we recruit for a permanent Executive Director. 

Please feel free to contact me at chair@datadryad.org or Trisha at director@datadryad.org if you have any questions.