SILS dean feels responsibility to lead
Jeffrey Bardzell sees a future in which the values that shaped libraries will guide emerging technologies.

When Jeffrey Bardzell became dean of the UNC School of Information and Library Science in April 2024, he said he was grateful to join a school with a “deep commitment to the quality of and access to information as a foundation of democratic society.”
Bardzell has had nearly a year now to witness and help grow that commitment, whether it be cross-campus collaborations on medical research, student-led digital literacy outreach or research from faculty on misinformation and music accessibility.
He spoke to The Well about what he’s learned at SILS and where it’s going.
What is something you have learned about the University since you arrived?
I have worked in large public universities for over 30 years. What sets UNC-Chapel Hill apart is the forging of meaningful connections and a shared ethic of care among staff, students, administrators and faculty. People don’t just make themselves available — they go out of their way to help each other. Students and alumni consistently share that they don’t feel like “just a number.” I think that’s a real achievement for a large public university, and I’m motivated to honor that achievement and do what I can to carry it forward.
How is SILS fulfilling Carolina’s mission of teaching, research and public service?
Academically, SILS bridges disciplines, contributing expertise in human-centered information and data science into nearly infinite application areas, including health and medicine, governance and policy, cultural heritage, creativity support and environmental studies.
We’re home to the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life, a groundbreaking research center that brings together critical social scientists across fields — including sociology, journalism, information science and political communication — to illuminate how technology is neither neutral nor ahistorical.
Our Carolina Health Informatics Program brings together a powerhouse combination: all five health and medicine schools, the School of Data Science and Society, the Health Sciences Library and the UNC College of Arts and Sciences.
What’s one example of how you are addressing a current top priority for your school?
Information- and data-related disciplines evolve quickly, so schools like SILS need the agility not just to keep up with but to drive and shape those fields, both as academic disciplines and as professions directly shaping society. The meteoric rise of artificial intelligence — predicted for many decades but now finally upon us — represents a huge opportunity for SILS, with its enduring commitments to human-centered and socially aware approaches to technological change.
We have a responsibility to lead the growing field of informatics by developing new academic programs, growing and enriching existing programs and forging new research and curricular collaborations across the University. Our faculty are developing innovative translations of their research into cutting-edge curricula, training future leaders for North Carolina and beyond.
What do you want others to know about SILS?
SILS has helped transform emerging informational and technological capabilities into actual systems, products, policies and other human-facing outcomes. Libraries — including public libraries and research libraries but also libraries within organizations — are a part of that.
One of the powers of libraries is how they “reach out” beyond themselves, crafting the pathways by which data becomes information, which becomes knowledge, which becomes wisdom. They do so in a way that is shaped by values of universal access to knowledge, freedom of thought and expression, and the careful curation and preservation of what is known.
As we approach our 100th year as a school, I envision a future where these values guide how we shape emerging technologies of AI, autonomous vehicles and robots, smart government and social media. Human interaction and connection must be at the heart of our research and teaching.