Hi Andrea
My name is Heather Tushinski and I"m the docent co-ordinator for the
McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinberg Ontario, Canada.   We read
yor e-mail and wondered if we could share in the responses to your
questions?  Our program has about 20 weekday docents for the school
programs and 12 on the weekends offering general tours of our permanent
collection and whatever special exhibition is running at any given time.
We have about 8 docents on leave at the moment.  Our docents are very
loyal.  If they make it through the first year of training and return in
September they usually stay for numerous years.  We have had the best luck
with people who have retired.  We have tried students enrolled in a fine
arts program at the local university and find they drop out at exam time
and don't return even though they enjoy the program.  Our docents who have
growing familiesstick with the program for awhile (some for a few years)
but express their stress about the time factor-they also seem to be
involved in other committees.   Our docents work in buddy groups, which
they form themselves with other docents who work on their day, and are
responsible for finding their own replacement.  It is still a problem when
it is short notice sometimes and we sometimes try to replace them with
educators on call, museum staff.  It is a headache!!  If anyone has a more
efficient system please let me know.  Thanks in advance.
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