>I can't think of any organization that would be of use to all kinds of staff >in all kinds of museums. I can--the American Association of Museums. I resisted joining for many years due to the cost of membership plus the need to join other professional organizations more closely connected with what I do. There is a budgetary limit to how many professional organizations one can join, after all. I would occasionally thumb through "Museum News" in the library and think, "there is not much here of interest to me." However, since joining the AAM a year ago, I have become a regular reader of "Museum News" and "Aviso", I attended part of the St. Louis meeting, and I have taken advantage of the AAM bookstore. It has become clear to me that the AAM is a tremendous professional resource for anyone who is a museum professional (or museum studies student). I discovered that there was a lot more of interest to me in "Museum News" that I had thought. A former director of mine (reflecting a fairly typical natural history museum attitude) used to say, "So what does the AAM do for natural history museums?" I can now answer that question--the same thing they do for any other kind of museum, which is to provide resources and a means of communication of ideas for museum professionals. And no, AAM did not pay me to say this (but if they would like to send me a check I will accept it). --John John E. Simmons Collection Manager, Natural History Museum and Coordinator, Historical Administration and Museum Studies Program University of Kansas Dyche Hall 1345 Jayhawk Boulevard Lawrence, Kansas 66045-7561 Phone 785-864-4508 FAX 785-864-5335 [log in to unmask] ========================================================= 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).