In a few weeks, the CNI community will gather in DC for the annual CNI Fall 2025 Membership Meeting. This year’s program reflects the challenges and opportunities our members are navigating and draws on the community’s deep expertise for perspective, sense-making, and direction. Our intention is that each attendee leaves the meeting with something useful— an insight, an appointment to explore a new collaboration, or a bolstered sense of resonance and connection (or, hopefully, all of these!). You can view the complete meeting program, including session and schedule details, on our website.

I wanted to specifically highlight that for the closing plenary, Deborah Altenburg, vice president for research policy and advocacy at the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities, will address how federal research funding and policy shifts are transforming the foundation of the US science and technology ecosystem in her talk, The State of Funding for US Higher Education, Science, and Technology in a Time of Change. She’ll overview key research and education policy updates, assess the current federal funding landscape, and highlight emerging opportunities for institutions and researchers navigating this evolving environment.

The closing will also include a guest presentation of the 2025 AUPresses Stand UP Award, which honors those not currently on staff at a member press who have supported, defended, and celebrated the university press community and mission, by Peter Berkery, executive director of the Association of University Presses. 

Since our last announcement, we’ve also finalized the opening plenary details. My introductory talk, Shaping CNI’s Future Together, will be followed by Benjamin Lee’s presentation A Landscape of Artificial Intelligence in Libraries, or “What Librarians Talk About When They Talk About AI.” You can read more about the plenaries on our website.  

We’ll announce when sessions recordings are available so that our broader community is also able to benefit from our presenters’ insights. As always, the CNI staff are available to you with any questions, suggestions, or feedback—we love hearing from you.

With excitement,

Kate