SAA Issues & Advocacy Roundtable - Recently Updated Pages

Contact list- regional organizations

heathersoyka — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:31:08 CST

	Contact:	Contacted by:
Academy of Certified Archivists (ACA)	Jane Nokes	Heather Soyka
Association of Hawaii Archivists
Central Texas Archivists		Heather Soyka
Consortium of Iowa Archivists
Council of Inter-Mountain Archivists (CIMA)	Michael Frazier
Louisiana Archives and Manuscripts Association
Kentucky Council on Archives	Mark Myers
Maine Archives and Museums
Michigan Archival Association
Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference (MARAC)	Danna Bell-Russell	Kate Theimer
Midwest Archives Conference (MAC)	Tanya Zanish-Belcher	Kate Theimer
New England Archivists (NEA)	Peter Carini	Kate Theimer
New Hampshire Archivists
New York Archives Conference (NYAC)	Bridget Bower
Northwest Archivists	Terry Baxter	Kate Theimer
Society of Alabama Archivists
Society of California Archivists
Society of Florida Archivists
Society of Georgia Archivists	Courtney Chartier	Courtney Chartier
Society of Indiana Archivists	Brenda Burk	Alison Stankrauff
Society of Mississippi Archivists	Ryan Semmes
Society of North Carolina Archivists
Society of Ohio Archivists (SOA)		Heather Soyka
Society of Rocky Mountain Archivists (SRMA)		Laura Starrett
Society of Southwest Archivists (SSA)	Brenda McClurkin	Heather Soyka

White Paper/Resource Topics

KateT. — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:34:17 CST

Use this space to discuss ideas for white papers or other resources related to the roundtable's topic. Can someone go through the notes from the meeting and start adding some content here?

- Income disparity (see discussion thread)

Ideas for "Mid-Career Professionals" (good for everyone)

KateT. — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:10:27 CST

From "Mid-Career Professionals and Museum Leadership," Douglas Stark, History News (AASLH Member Publication), Summer 2008.

Does this sound familiar?

"Too often, mid-level professionals feel as if they have stalled in their careers. To them, the field feels compartmentalized, and plum jobs often seem to have a low turnover rate. These issues are further compounded by limited networking opportunities.

Frustrated and disappointed, many leave the profession. Those who stay often lack the resources for career guidance. The absence of a clear-cut path of upward mobility within museums creates uncertainty in the minds of mid-level professionals. As workers invest in their careers, museums must match that investment by providing resources, guidance, and a succession plan to groom the next generation. . . ."

Stark identifies the following steps mid-career professionals can take to increase their "personal investment portfolio" (i.e. investments in one's career):

Volunteer at another museum to get new skills/demonstrate initiative.
Join professional organizations & participate in them.
Network ("At least two-thirds of all jobs are obtained through some form of networking"--wonder where he got that figure?)
Utilize professional mentors
Get mid-career training (update skills, get training in fundraising, communications and marketing or administration), attend one of the various Leadership Intitutes (which again, are great networking opportunities).
Try for a bigger job at a smaller place
Develop skills outside the museum (broader community or civic involvement)

Anyt thoughts on these ideas?

Discussion of career issues

KateT. — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:00:49 CST

Ideas for "Mid-Career Professionals" (good for everyone)

Archivists making ends meet session

dmiller77 — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 17:36:22 CDT

1. Title: Appraising the Archives Profession: Multiple Outlooks on Professional Sustainability (aka, The mythical quest for personal prosperity in the archives!)

2. Abstract (75 words):

Most archivists work out of love for their craft, and it would be rare indeed to go into archives "for the money." Nevertheless, issues such as low salary (compared to length and cost of education), the temporary nature of many jobs, and fewer opportunities for advancement are major hurdles to overcome at a time when the profession is struggling to attract a more diverse workforce and retain experienced practitioners. In this frank discussion, panelists at various stages in their careers will discuss their experiences and open a dialogue in effort to address the white elephant issues of the profession. What do a grad student, a newbie processor, a manager/hiring administrator, and an expat have to say about the state of the archives profession today, and where do you fall on the spectrum? Suggestions for positive change and provocative ideas are in the works...

3. Topics:

Advocacy & Professionalism

4. Participants: I have emailed a call for participants to the A&A listserve 10/02.

Session Chair- Christina Fidler/Dana Miller

Speaker 1 (grad student) Ann is going to look for one in the Austin area.

Speaker 2 (newbie processor) I contacted someone- can everyone else please contact one more person?

Speaker 3 (manager/hiring administrator) Kate is looking for someone?

Speaker 4 (expat who has left the profession) Ann looking for one in the Austin area.

5. Proposer- Dana Miller.

6. Format: Panel discussion

7. Educational Objective and Relationship to Meeting Theme and Priorities (75 words):

Archivists at all levels experience issues of professional sustainability in private and public ways. Job seekers face challenges in finding and landing a good paying, permanent job with benefits, while those who do hiring struggle to get enough resources to offer the competitive salaries and benefits packagesthat attract qualified candidates. Without incentives like good pay and job security, many potential archivists will opt out of or leave the profession, risking long-term professional sustainability, and devastating growth and change. We must first honestly address potential problems in order to begin to create solutions. Through this session, the panelists hope to devise possible solutions and attainable goals to address the fundamental needs of the archival professional.

8. Target Audience-

This session will help tobroaden their perspectives of archivists at all levels who have to deal with job seeking or hiring, and will help manygain insight into the values and desires of other players in the job market. Students and early career archivists especially will benefit from this session, which will help to clarify the professional landscape as they build their careers, as will anyone who has to do hiring also benefit from hearing what potential hires are looking for.

9. Will we accept changes from the program committee? Yes.

10. AV Needs- yes, a powerpoint will be shown to introduce and give data background

11. Group Endorsements- Issues and Advocacy Roundtable?

Annual Meeting Session Ideas

KateT. — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 08:47:44 CDT

Possible session ideas for the next SAA Annual Meeting--deadline is October 8.

1. Real World Skills They Didn't Teach Me in Library School (Stasia and Heather)
Possible topics--negotiating skills (for salaries, budgets, etc), management/budgeting, possibly supervising, fundraising, working with volunteers too.
Approach Archival Management or Lone Arrangers for suggestions, co/sponsorship?

2. Diversity of Viewpoints on Challenge to the Sustainability of the Profession (Stasia, Kate, Dana)
A panel composed of people at different points in their careers--recent grad, someone who's been employed for under 3 years, a manager responsible for hiring, someone who's left the profession and someone who is considering leaving. Each talks about what challenges they see . . .
Note--I've got a friend who'd been willing to talk about her experience taking a big pay cut in order to get a foot in the door at the National Archives, if you'd be interested in that perspective.
Not sure we can find people to actually talk honestly about this stuff, but it would be great.
Approach Archival Management, other co-sponsors? Get someone from state archives (try New York) to emphasize CoSA angle.

Could this be combined with #5 to make one really strong proposal? [h]
I'm in favor of combining this one with #5. [stasia]
I am also- more below. [kathleen]

3. How to Advocate for the Archival Profession to Non-Professionals (Peter and Kate)
Tips on how to make the argument for archival advocacy to influence makers.
Possible speakers:
- Lee White (NCH): Lobbying at the national level from a professional lobbyist's perspective. (not yet contacted)
- Kathleen Roe: Organizing and lobbying for PAHR from an archivist's perspective (Kathleen is in--she was already planning on doing something like this so we're joining forces)
- Advocating at State Level: suggestion we find someone from New Jersey--(Speaker confirmed--he's a past president of CoSA, so that should help too)
- Possibly someone from ALA Advocacy Office as moderator or speaker?

During the I&A meeting, wasn't there a suggestion to add a speaker that talked about how to advocate from the ground up? (I think there was mention of someone from U-W Madison, if memory serves). I think that could be a really interesting session. [h]

I'll follow up with Nancy on who she was talking about--it was someone who spoke at the Leadership Institute. [k]

I'm working with Kathleen on getting a moderator and another speaker. We might contact the editor of the forthcoming SAA book on advocacy. (Kate)

4. Sustaining the profession by attracting a more ethnically and socio-economically diverse workforce (Anna and Christina)
Diversity, outreach to the K-12/minority students, provide role models, etc. [question here is, are there any positive examples of such a program?]
Reference, Access, and Outreach roundtable may be able to help with this.
Also contact Terry about Diversity Committee help.

The diversity committee has been asked to endorse one other session, but this one looks interesting as well. If it was me, I'd think about breaking this into three pieces for a session. 1. why is the profession (along with the librarians and curators) so undiverse right now? Elizabeth Adkins AA article would be a good start, but some analysis of why we are so middle-aged, female, and white could be useful in figuring out how to change it. 2. Take a look at what's being done now. The SAA Brochure Task Force (to create recruitment materials) is a good example of good intentions but a generation gapped message. The First Person Match project is another approach that might yield results. 3. What could be done to increase diversity? One possibility would be jumping on the archivist activist bandwagon and pitching the profession as a social justice profession instead of an information profession or an accoutability profession. Some random thoughts. (t)

I agree with Terry-- analysis of these factors may help, and I think that's a good place to start in forming a proposal. We may also want to talk about upper administration in archives and special collections, and the even-less-diverse nature of archival leadership: overwhelmingly white, male, and older. [h]

Good point - a session that talked about the difference between members and leaders in re diversity would be very interesting. (t)

5. You Want What?! Bridging the Expectations Gap Between Archival Generations (Kate, Kheir, Dana)
Setting salary and other expectations - bridging the gap between young archivists and upper management. Essentially, people coming into the profession now have very different expectations than their predecessors did--how can we all learn to respect that and get along?
Possible tie-in in Archival Managment roundtable here

Two manager speakers
Two new archivist speakers

Some of the other topics within this session could be : educational and experience expectations (and how they have changed, for better or worse), changing expectations of practice and theory in the field, differences between those who have been in the field w/practical experience for a decade vs. a graduate education. Ideas? I'm sure there are more issues out there! [h]

SAA Issues & Advocacy Roundtable Home

KateT. — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 08:54:29 CDT

Hello!

We've set up this wiki as a place for our roundtable to discuss ideas and work on projects. Please take a look around and share any thoughts you have about what we can do to move forward on our selected topic:

Our goal is to explore issues related to the financial and professional issues archivists and related information professionals face in trying to earn acceptable compensation, access to health care insurance, professional advancement and financial challenges while staying in the archival profession.