Before you make judgments, I think you ought to try to find out who
     applied.  Perhaps a larger majority of large and/or east coast museums
     applied than did small museums in other areas of the country.

     Laura McMann Mahoney
     [log in to unmask]

     --------------

     Is there something I don't understand about the program?  The grants
     were
     announced this morning (imls.fed.gov) and, while I only had time for a
     quick glance, large institutions seemed to get the bulk of the awards.
     Not just in dollar terms, but in numbers of awards.  For example, all
     of the winners in Michigan were funded at the max and in Ohio, as
     well.  In Mass., most of the awards seemed to be at the max. This is
     especially interesting since, at least in the history area, small
     museums outnumber large one greatly.  I have worked with both large
     and small institutions and think that some wonderful small museums
     that are extremely effective were overlooked (and are overlooked on a
     regular basis for all sorts of Federal grant programs) while some
     giant museums with ordinary programs and unremarkable collections are
     funded, seemingly, every cycle.
     My understanding was that institutions were judged in budget groups so
     a
     musecum with a $100,000 budget would not be measured by the standards
     of a 2,000,000 institution.
     There also seems to be a regional slant as well, with the East
     getting the
     lion's share.