As one who spends real time with real people in a real museum environment, I'm just glad sometimes that smaller museums like ours can "just stagger along." We can "make do" only because of our volunteers, and they don't feel at all put upon. In fact, they love working with a museum so long as they don't have to deal with the tough questions such as replacing HVAC equipment, repairing roofs, meeting our payroll, competing for limited private sector funding. No offense intended, Mr. Segal, but institutions (museums as well as universities) consist of people. The workers and the volunteers ARE the institutions. Ross Weeks Jr. ----- Original Message ----- From: Troy Segal <[log in to unmask]> > Why shouldn't an institution have to "pay for all it gets"? Don't most > employers? If a business ran the way a museum does--getting by with free > labor--it would be called exploitation. I believe that a museum always has to > "break even"--or risk losing its status as a nonprofit. . > I think everybody loses--because museums won't invest in personnel or > resources, but stagger along in a makeshift, make-do manner. We don't have > "both sides benefitting" now, we have the institutions benefitting--at the > expense of the workers, both current and those of the future, who can't find > employment. ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ museum-l.html. 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).