I agree with Diane.  The volunteer was completely at fault and should be
released from the museum immediately.  I have seen volunteers do things
that made me wonder, but I've never seen anything this improper.  In
essence the volunteer was acting as though his judgments were more
reasoned than the museum's.  In all probability, the volunteer had no
idea what strategies governed the deaccession policy and it wouldn't
have made any difference had he knew.  He decided that he knew better
than the museum he works for.  Collection management policies were
designed to protect collections, museums and staff members.  If this
action is allowed to stand, then collection management policies mean
nothing.

Jeff Tenuth
Indiana State Museum

-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Diane Gutenkauf
Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 1:41 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [MUSEUM-L] Strange situation

Pam,
You've completely missed the point and you are wrong. The volunteer
overstepped his bounds, acted improperly, and probably is in violation
of the museum's ethics and collections policies. 

The volunteer wasn't "put in the awkward position" --he put himself
there. 
The museum made a well reasoned and conscious decision to deaccession by
disposal of inappropriate material. The volunteer had NO business
interfering. 
Then he made the completely inappropriate decision to pawn the material
off on another museum and misrepresented himself and the donor of the
collection. These are actionable offenses.

If this volunteer had a problem with his institution's policies and
proceedures, he should have taken the matter up with 1st his supervisor
and 2nd with museum administration. 

And I reiterate...The museum did nothing wrong and has nothing for which
it must take responsibility...other perhaps than retraining that
volunteer as to what constitutes proper ethical practice. 

Diane


On Wed, 1 Nov 2006 12:52:49 EST, Pamela Silvestri <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> 
...snip...
> 
>Considering the circumstances, I believe the volunteer acted in an 
>appropriate manner. He was put in the awkward position of having to 
>make
the  decision 
>to remove the articles from the trash. And then, not wanting to retain

>the materials himself, donated them to a place that could care for
them,  etc.
> 
>The original museum should not 'blame the victim' here and needs to 
>admit their mistakes and error in judgement and take responsibility for
them.
> 
>Pam

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