News for and about the Internet2 community

[Lauren Rotman <>]

Ana Preston Named New Internet2 Executive Director of Member Relations  
and Communications

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – November 16, 2009  –  Ana Preston, Internet2’s  
current Director for Regional and State Network Relations, and interim  
Director for International Relations, has been named Internet2’s new  
Executive Director for Member Relations and Communications (MRC).

In this role, Ana will assume management responsibility for the  
organization’s member engagement and communications activities. Ana  
will work closely with members, partners, and community  
representatives to evaluate and promote the community’s advanced  
cyberinfrastructure services and initiatives that support research and  
educational missions. She will also work with the Internet2 executive  
team and its governance to coordinate member outreach and appropriate  
communications to key stakeholder groups and the public.

“We are delighted that Ana will become a key member of the Internet2  
management team. Ana’s dedication over the past 8 years in working  
with our members to ensure they are continually engaged and informed  
has resulted in many new and exciting collaborations in the Internet2  
community.” said Doug Van Houweling, Internet2 president and CEO. “In  
this new role, I know Ana will have great success in expanding  
Internet2’s community engagement to ensure the broad membership is  
actively supported. Ana will work with the membership to meet today’s  
needs and position us to anticipate the rapidly evolving nature of the  
research and education environment.”

Ana joined Internet2 in 2001 as Program Manager for International  
Relations. In her five years in that role, she helped to bring more  
than 15 international partners to Internet2, while leading efforts to  
connect and collaborate with emerging national research and education  
networks. She then took on the role of Senior Program Manager for  
FiberCo, a subsidiary of Internet2 that serves as a dark fiber holding  
company, where she was responsible for brokering dark fiber  
acquisitions and managing consulting and professional network services  
to regional optical networking initiatives in the United States and  
Canada.

Currently, Ana serves as Director, State and Regional Network  
Relations. In this position, she leads efforts to engage, collaborate  
and partner with the network member organizations that both provide  
connectivity to Internet2’s network infrastructure and play an  
important role in Internet2 activities and governance. In this  
capacity, she has successfully implemented a proactive communication  
and engagement plan with this segment of the Internet2 membership.

Prior to joining Internet2, Ana worked for the CIO’s office at the  
University of Tennessee-Knoxville where she was responsible for  
collaborating with faculty and researchers on test deployments of next- 
generation technologies with a focus on assessing the utility and  
application development issues associated with installing new campus  
network technology. Ana also supported the development and provided  
initial planning for the Tennessee optical networking infrastructure.

“I am delighted to be taking on this greatly expanded role for  
Internet2 – an organization and a community that I believe is helping  
to support truly breakthrough innovation for research and education  
and for our broader society,” said Preston. “I am excited to join the  
executive team of Internet2 and look forward to working closely with  
our membership and our partners worldwide to ensure we continue to  
meet the needs of the community as well as provide a pathway for their  
future discoveries.”

Tim Lance, president of NYSERNet and member of the executive search  
advisory committee said, “Many of us in the research and education  
community know Ana well for her contributions in a spectrum of roles  
at Internet2. Though her assignments were quite varied, two factors  
were common: the passion and absolute integrity she brought to each  
Internet2 assignment, and the importance she gave to each person and  
organization she dealt with.  We could not have hoped for better  
traits in this new role.”

Ana’s new appointment will begin December 1, 2009.


About Internet2(R)


Internet2 is the foremost U.S. advanced networking consortium. Led by  
the research and education community since 1996, Internet2 promotes  
the missions of its members by providing both leading-edge network  
capabilities and unique partnership opportunities that together  
facilitate the development, deployment and use of revolutionary  
Internet technologies. Internet2 brings the U.S. research and academic  
community together with technology leaders from industry, government  
and the international community to undertake collaborative efforts  
that have a fundamental impact on tomorrow's Internet.


For more information: http://www.internet2.edu




CONTACT:

Lauren Rotman
Internet2