Barbara Kline Pope, executive director of Johns Hopkins University Press (JHUP) since 2017, plans to retire effective Feb. 1, 2027.
Hopkins officials say information on a search for Pope’s successor will be shared in the coming weeks.
“Barbara has led the Press with vision, passion and profound dedication to the cause of scholarly publishing,” President Ron Daniels and Interim Provost Lainie Rutkow wrote in a message to the Hopkins community. “Throughout the last nine years, Barbara’s tenure at the helm of JHUP has truly embodied the Hopkins ethos of bringing the benefits of discovery to the world.”
Founded in 1878, Hopkins Press is the nation’s first university press and currently operates four interconnected publishing businesses. According to the Hub, the university’s in-house news source, it publishes 120 journals and manages membership for 27 scholarly and professional associations and societies. It has a division that publishes 120 new books a year and maintains a backlist of more than 3,500 titles, and a division that distributes books for 18 university presses. It’s home to Project MUSE, a leading provider of digital humanities and social sciences content.
Pope came to Hopkins Press from the National Academies Press, the publishing program of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, where she was the executive director from 1997 to 2017. She also served as president of the Association of University Presses and sat on the management board at MIT Press.
According to the Hub, Pope steered Hopkins Press “through a complex era for academic publishing characterized by industrywide consolidation, shrinking higher education budgets, and the challenges and opportunities associated with the growth of artificial intelligence.”
During her tenure, the Hub noted, the Press’ journal program grew by nearly 30 percent and Project MUSE pioneered a business model of open-access academic publishing dedicated to making high-quality, peer-reviewed research broadly accessible. More recently, the Hub said, Pope helped facilitate the integration of the Press and BioOne, a nonprofit biological science aggregator whose collection of more than 200 journals and hundreds of books complements Project MUSE’s range. This fall, the Press will publish Johns Hopkins: The First 150 Years, the first single-volume history of the institution, by historians Andrew Jewett and Jonathan Strassfeld.
“It’s been a privilege to have led such a historic press at a university that has one eye toward that history but another one toward deep and creative innovation,” the Hub quoted Pope as saying. “There’s an energy and culture here that allows each of us to reach higher. Cultivating that culture at the Press and creating an inclusive environment for all our staff that focuses on learning and on honoring others’ dignity has been one of the greatest joys of my career.”
“The breadth and depth of Barbara’s insight and expertise have successfully stewarded JHUP’s full portfolio,” Daniels and Rutkow wrote in their message to the community. “Barbara has led JHUP with innovation, integrity, and compassion, and she leaves the Press well positioned to continue to grow and flourish in the years ahead.”
