Byron Johnson writes about the (new?) British National Vocational
Qualifications and Museums Association Diploma requirements.

I'm not up on what the Brits are doing, but I was under the impression that
the MA had just about abandoned its Diploma in favour of the govt-funded
Museum Training Institute.

The nub of the difficulty is the issue of whether a professional
organisation goes down the track of credentialling or registering its
members, as architects and engineers do.  It's a very demanding (read
expensive) process, and requires a substantial investment in organisational
apparatus to do it with no hint of cronyism.  This is one reason why
membership of the architects' and engineers' institutes is so dear.

The notion of the profession governing itself is very, well,
professionalist in a rather late 19thC way - is it still appropriate in the
late 20thC?

It seems to me that there are sufficient academic credentials to set
education standards for the museums industry, and sufficient standards of
practice established by practice and documented in the literature, to say
that our trade has a soundly based set of standards.

I think that what we need from our professional associations is sets of
ethics that guide how and to whom we apply the standards.

Hmmm?




Linda Young
Cultural Heritage Management
University of Canberra
[log in to unmask]