Library Director and Department Chair Constantia Constantinou Appointed to the Rank of Distinguished Librarian

Stephen B. Luce Library proudly announces that Ms. Constantia Constantinou has been appointed as SUNY Distinguished Librarian, the highest rank conferred upon SUNY librarians. This is a remarkable accomplishment for Ms. Constantinou as there were only three other Distinguished Librarians in the history of SUNY.

SUNY news release on Ms. Constantinou’s appointed as Distinguished Librarian

In extending its distinguished ranks to the library faculty, SUNY recognizes the accomplishments of its entire faculty, and also assumes national leadership within the academy by becoming the first university system to so encourage and foster the full potential of the faculty status of librarians.

The Distinguished Librarian is a prestigious tenured University rank that is awarded to librarians whose contributions have been transformational in creating a new information environment by providing access to information, sharing or networking information resources, and fostering information literacy. The Distinguished Librarian rank honors and promotes the achievement of personal excellence, groundbreaking professional progress, and wide-ranging benefit to the academic community. Receiving this rank today is:

Constantia Constantinou has been the Director of the Stephen B. Luce Library at the Maritime College since 2001. She has served on the SUNY Council of Library Directors (SCLD) and represented SCLD on the CUNY Council of Chief Librarians and to the New York State Higher Education Initiative. As a Fulbright Scholar (2011) and as a Fulbright Senior Specialist (2005), in the country of Cyprus, she has accomplished what no other scholar or librarian has been able to do since 1974 by bringing the Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot academic communities closer through overcoming ethnic and political conflicts. To achieve this, Ms. Constantinou established collaborations among institutions, lectured and trained librarians in information literacy, enabled the membership of the University of Cyprus into OCLC global bibliographic network, and promoted the establishment of the Cyprus National Library Consortium. Ms. Constantinou’s scholarly work and presentations in Croatia, Greece, Turkey, China, Korea, Russia, Ukraine, and the United States have enhanced the principles of information literacy by setting exemplary standards within worldwide maritime universities.