Catherine Brooks has been appointed Director after P. Bryan Heidorn takes on his new appointment as Director of Research Initiatives for the School. Brooks brings more than 20 years of faculty experience in higher education, 4 years of Associate Chair/Associate Director work combined on two different campuses, and 3 years as founding Director of the School's research Center for Digital Society and Data Studies. 

In his nine years as School Director, Heidorn forged a merger of two units creating today's iSchool, and oversaw the successful re-accreditation of UA's successful graduate program in Library and Information Science. His ongoing focus on research projects in the School harnesses his experience on large research teams and former work with the National Science Foundation. Heidorn will also take the reins as Director of the Center for Digital Society and Data Studies, a research center in the School http://cdsds.arizona.edu.

Catherine’s primary research interests focus on issues of language and culture, with particular concern about online propaganda, data privacy and digital exclusion. She has published scholarly work on a variety of topics to include supporting faculty online and training students for life and work in a digital society. She has also published in non-scholarly outlets such as Scientific American and Wired magazine.