Dear Mr. van Balgooy: You bring up some very interesting and relevant issues regarding AAM (and other) conferences. I would like to see more practical career building workshops that focus on workplace issues, maintaining high standards of professionalism, ethics among museum professionals, and working within hybrid organizations that fuse (or attempt to fuse) people from differing professional walks of life. I think there is room for spirited conversation and serious contemplation on the types of changes museum people are going through. I would also like to see the issue of salaries addressed. There are a lot of museum professionals who have put in time, money, enthusiasm and flexibility to work in a field that has historically not paid much in salaries. I am sure there are plenty of people out there who have stories to tell of the museum position advertisement (for say a collections manager, curator, or director) that requires a good deal of experience, education, organizational and writing skills, financial savvy, and good people skills for the priviledge of earning a mere $18,000 to 20,000 a year. I realize that many museums are not exactly cash cows, but there are museums that can offer a decent salary but won't- for whatever reason. Am I asking too much? (pun intended!) Recruiting and keeping talented professional staff should not be on the cheap. I suppose many people will work for a lot less than what they are worth just to get a job. But, I also think there is a moral imperative here. Arlyn Danielson [log in to unmask] ---------- From: M. A. van Balgooy[SMTP:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Tuesday, July 01, 1997 5:02 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Museum News -Reply Nancy Pope wrote: > > >>> What do others think about Museum News in general? > > I agree that MN seems more attuned to graphic style rather than content > (which has become so repetitive that I rarely do more than flip through the > pages anymore). I would like to extend this discussion to the AAM > conference sessions. Are there others who find little new in most of those > sessions? I concur with Nancy's observations that MN rarely offers me anything significant. I especially grow suspect of its editorial stance when I read about important museum issues in the LA Times yet never see a word mentioned in MN (e.g., leadership issues at the LA County Museum of Natural History). As for the conference, I've grown to appreciate them mostly for the contacts I make. Some sessions are valuable, but mostly when they bring in outside speakers to provide new or different perspectives. Unfortunately, I've chaired a couple panels and the AAM (and other organizations) doesn't encourage the use of "outsiders" (they want only AAM members speaking, require registration fees or only passes for that day). I understand the session proposals are becoming more detailed and complex (the EdComm version requires pages and pages on content and speaker qualifications) in order to shake out some quality sessions. But I'm not sure if the conference can ever achieve consistently high quality sessions when the speakers are unpaid and research/scholarship is not encouraged. The result is the typical "here's a program I did and how I did it" session. I may have opened a can of worms, but I would like to see what others think. -- Max A. van Balgooy mailto:[log in to unmask] Chaffey Communities Cultural Center & Cooper Regional History Museum PO Box 772 Upland, CA 91785-0772 Telephone (909) 982-8010 Website: http://www.culturalcenter.org Homestead Museum 15415 East Don Julian Road Industry, CA 91745-1029 Telephone (818) 968-8492 Fax (818) 968-2048 Website: http://www.homesteadmuseum.org