Hi Karla

Getting a job later?  Unfortunately I'm not at the "later" part of my career
yet so I don't think I can give you much advice there, except to maybe ease
some fears you may have.  Generally, I'm learning that this profession is
rather odd in that many of the positions are grant funded, and often times
you won't begin with a full time job.  My current job at Harper College is
only 20 hours a week, and I only volunteer for 7 hours on top of that at the
Chicago Historical Society.  Also, you're likely to being working in an
archives that nobody knows about.  In other words, you won't get into a
prestigious or well known archives right away because they all want 2-5 or so
years of experience - at least in my neck of the woods (Chicago); I can't
speak for other areas.

I know that when I first started these 2 positions I was affraid that my
present lack of a full time archival job would hurt my chances for employment
later on down the line, but other archivists have told me the experience I
gain at my jobs and the accomplishments I make are far more important than
how many hours you're working.  So the fact that I'm the "lone arranger" (the
only staff member) at the Harper Archives and am fully in charge of every
facet of that repository from drafting management policies to processing
collections will have more importance to future employers than how many hours
I work.  At least that's what everyone is telling me.

Hope this helps.

Martin Firestein

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).