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California Library Hall of Fame

Rick Burke

Rick Burke graduated from UC Santa Cruz in 1974 and obtained his MLS from the UCLA School of Library and Information Science in 1980. Early in his career, he was employed as a Judaica librarian at a number of libraries in the Los Angeles area, including UCLA, Hebrew Union College, Sephardic Temple Tifereth Israel, and the University of Judaism, which later changed its name to the American Jewish University. Burke served as the University Librarian (aka library director) at the Ostrow Library of the American Jewish University from 1987-2006.

Rick Burke’s involvement with what was then known as the Southern California Electronic Library Consortium began when his library joined SCELC in 1994.  Starting in 1998, he assumed leadership positions in SCELC.  In June 2001, when SCELC incorporated as the Statewide California Library Consortium, he became the founding Executive Director while still library director at the Ostrow Library.  He eventually resigned from his library to work for SCELC full time in 2006.  Burke retired from SCELC in July 2021.

Under his guidance, SCELC has grown to become one of the most respected library consortia in the country, with over 300 participating libraries and a wide range of innovative programs and services that benefit academic and research libraries and hundreds of thousands of students in California and beyond. Burke’s dedication to the mission of SCELC was unwavering, and he worked tirelessly to ensure that the organization remained focused on its core mission of supporting libraries and advancing the profession.

Burke is a true visionary with an entrepreneurial spirit, and he was not afraid to take risks in order to achieve his goals. He recognized early on that the digital revolution would have a profound impact on libraries, and he was one of the first to advocate for the use of digital technologies to enhance library services and resources. Burke has also been a strong advocate for open access to information, and he championed the use of open access publishing models as a way to make research more accessible and widely available.

Burke is a tireless advocate for libraries and the library profession in California. He learned early to recognize the important role that libraries play in promoting learning, advancing knowledge, and supporting research. Burke was a powerful voice in the library community, and his advocacy helped to raise the profile of libraries and the important work they do. He is a fierce advocate for smaller institutions and was perhaps first to convince major journal publishers to develop tiered pricing models favorable to the smallest institutions. He proved that subscriptions from many smaller institutions eager to provide students scholarly journal packages was a sustainable revenue generator. With subscription revenue equivalent to major state systems, SCELC is now poised to transform these agreements to open access publishing models, thanks to Burke's advocacy.

Rick Burke’s contributions to the library profession in California have been significant, and they demonstrate his unique and lasting impact on the profession. Through his leadership, vision, and advocacy, Burke helped to transform SCELC into a leading force in the library community, and he played a key role in advancing the mission of libraries and the library profession in California