Please Note: This message has been cross-posted on Museum-L, AASLH Small Museums, and AASLH Historic House Museums. Dear Colleagues: My organization, which manages more than two dozen historic sites across the Commonwealth of Virginia, has been actively seeking alternative methods of site management for some of our smaller sites over the past few years. Unfortunately our sites are fairly diverse geographically and while they do share the services of statewide staff (Director of Preservation, Curator, Educational Coordinator, PR coordinator, etc.) we haven't been able to combine on-site duties within the organization effectively and currently have part time staff handling operations at several of our sites, with limited success. We have found that having a full-time site manager (to handle day-to-day operations, docent scheduling, etc.) is no longer cost effective and have been looking at other models (including sharing staff with other museums, which we have had some success with so far). I have been asked to find out what type of staffing is the norm (or at least which typeS of staffing are the norm) at small, seasonal, historic sites and house museums. By small I mean sites with annual visitation of about 5-6,000 or less. By seasonal I mean sites that are open several days a week during the busy tourist season and closed during the slow months (perhaps with weekends during the fall and spring). We are interested to know how many similar sites have full time operations staff (site managers/site coordinators/administrators, etc.) and how many make do with part time or volunteer management. If you have (or are) a full-time operations person, is he/she taking on additional responsibilities (including, for example, curatorial responsibilities, doing lots of marketing, or acting as director of the organization)? Do they spend a large portion of time organizing friends-groups or planning special events and programs? We typically require our administrators to handle scheduling, oversee maintenance, make deposits, etc. but they are not responsible for docent training or tour development or all but the most basic publicity and PR, which is handled in our statewide office. Has anyone else developed partnerships with other institutions to handle staffing issues? If you rely on part-time or volunteer services how to you recruit and retain qualified staff? Any input would be appreciated on list or off ([log in to unmask]). Many thanks! Catherine Dean Catherine E. Dean Curator of Collections APVA Preservation Virginia 204 West Franklin St. Richmond, VA 23228 804-648-1889 x313 FAX: 804-775-0802 ========================================================= 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).