Dr. Hilde van Wijngaarden

Dr. Hilde van Wijngaarden is Director of the University Library of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. She holds this position since 2017. Hilde has a strong focus on libraries’ support for Education and Research. In national and international collaboration she strives to achieve Open Science and focusses on the role of libraries facilitating Open Access, FAIR data and Open Education. She was chair of the Dutch consortium of university libraries and National Library (UKB) and executive board member of the Association of European Research Libraries (LIBER). At VU Amsterdam, she works with her team to empower the universities’ vision for broader perspectives, open dialogues and knowledge diversity.

With a PhD in history and a few years as an IT consultant Hilde started her carreer in libraries at the National Library of the Netherlands (KB). She was involved in many European projects and international collaboration on digital preservation and webarchiving. In 2011, Hilde moved to general management of University Libraries, first at the library of the University of Applied Sciences in Amsterdam, then as member of the management team of the library of the University of Amsterdam and then transferring to the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam