AASLH will hold its 2019 Annual Meeting and Online Conference in Philadelphia August 28-31. This year’s theme, What Are We Waiting For?, examines the personal, communal, and organizational journeys that lead to vibrancy, authenticity, social change and sustainability.
Unfortunately, many working in our nation’s small museums feel as if we can only dream of attending this meeting. In a perfect world, boards would grant every request to fund our professional development. Institutions of modest means, however, may not have the resources to help us become effective stewards of our community’s memory.
Websites, listservs, and social media constantly offer new sources of technical and psychological support, but nothing is better than sharing challenges, strategies and successes face-to-face. Every year, increasing numbers of Annual Meeting sessions address issues specifically affecting small museums. These sessions can be as practical and wide-ranging as training, marketing, and strategic planning. Other sessions focus on creative ways to forge and re-energize relationships with the surrounding community.
For the fourteenth year, AASLH’s Small Museums Affinity Community is offering scholarships to AASLH members who are full-time, part-time, paid, or volunteer employees of small museums. Each $700 scholarship will cover the cost of both the conference registration and the Small Museums luncheon. Any remaining funds may be used to offset travel and/or lodging expenses. Acceptance of the scholarship is contingent upon recipients submitting a post to the AASLH blog about their Annual Meeting experience.
To qualify, the applicant must work for a museum with a budget of $250,000 or less. They also must either be an individual AASLH member or work for an institutional member.
The deadline for applications is June 5. The committee will email award winners by June 21. For questions, please contact Bruce Teeple, Small Museums Scholarship Subcommittee Chair, at [email protected], or Aja Bain, AASLH Program and Publications Coordinator, at [email protected].
