Michael A. Lewis asked:

>Show of hands... how many of you got a job through
volunteer work?

What I'd like to know is how many (if any!) of you got
jobs *without* doing any volunteer work (including
unpaid internships), whether for the institution that
hired you or somewhere else. If you didn't have
volunteer experience, did you have other applicable
experience? Has anyone found it possible to get a job
without *any* experience of some sort?

My volunteer work helped me "sample" different aspects
of museum work, including collections and education
(with a paid internship adding exhibit development).
Most importantly, it put me ahead of every other
candidate with the same education, but less
experience. In a field this competitive, I can't even
imagine trying to find a job without some kind of
experience on my resume, paid or not.

Oh, and to answer Michael's question: In my volunteer
orientation at Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield
Village, I met a member of the education department
who hired me for a part-time position a couple of
months later. It wasn't a permanent position, but I'm
sure it helped to have it on my resume. It helped that
it was an evening position, as I also had a full-time
job and another part-time job during that time. You
gotta do what you gotta do... (Unfortunately, I hadn't
been available when the full-time position had been
open -- I'd had to go back to school to wrap things up
for my MA...)

M. Ehr

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