Leadership

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 1 The field is served by many professional organizations and leading institutions, both in North America and abroad, whose work helps promote and sustain conservation as a thriving discipline. However, there is no coordinated effort among these groups to identify or leverage activities taking place in the digital landscape that might have field-wide implications.[1] Nor are there any joint efforts underway that consider other digital initiatives and related work (e.g., data standards, preservation, building digital capacity) needed to make the digital landscape more functional. Conservators cite many important programs and projects taking place in the broader digital sphere that could be important for the field, but no one is taking a holistic view of these activities, or looking at the “big picture” to present a vision of what is needed to bring the current digital landscape more in line with the discipline’s needs.

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 2 In the absence of clear guidance and leadership, conservation professionals struggle to find ways to navigate the evolving digital landscape on their own. The result is countless numbers of local solutions to community-wide problems, unnecessary and redundant expenditures of time and money, and a proliferation of digital assets that cannot be readily shared. Coordinated leadership efforts among professional organizations and leading institutions, here and abroad, are needed to guide and collectively move the field forward in the digital arena.

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 0 Recommendations:

¶ 4 Leave a comment on paragraph 4 1 Leadership Forum (Short-term)
AIC should convene a forum of representatives from leading organizations in the conservation community to discuss:

¶ 5 Leave a comment on paragraph 5 0
Changes in the field’s leadership environment over the last decade
The impact these changes have had on the profession
Ways to coordinate leadership that will lead to positive changes in the digital landscape

¶ 6 Leave a comment on paragraph 6 2 Digital Strategies Advocate (Short-term)
FAIC should seek funds for a new position – a Digital Strategies Advocate – who would identify and drive coordinated digitization strategies across the community. This individual would serve as the central liaison for FAIC on digital initiatives in the profession and in allied communities. He/she would track advances in the field’s digital landscape, identify and help build collaborations in that landscape, and be responsible for promoting training and outreach for digital initiatives across the community. Funding should be sought to support the position for at least five years, at which time FAIC can reassess the position, the landscape, and the strategies needed to move it forward.

¶ 7 Leave a comment on paragraph 7 0 Funders Summit (Mid-term)
FAIC should convene a meeting of the field’s leading funders to report on leadership forum discussions, explain FAIC/AIC’s plans to help drive the transformation needed in conservation’s digital landscape, and solicit the funders’ thoughts and readiness to support these plans.

¶ 8 Leave a comment on paragraph 8 0 [1] See ConservationSpace http://www.conservationspace.org/Home.html; Lauren Robinson et al., April 6, 2015 “Conservation module in database”. [Online Forum Comment thread] MCN_L, Retrieved from http://mcn.edu/pipermail/mcn-l/2015-April/007940.html; and Integrating Data for Conservation Science, The Getty Conservation Institute. http://www.getty.edu/conservation/our_projects/science/integrating_data/related.html for some examples of interesting digital efforts underway in the field.

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Kristin deGhetaldi September 9, 2015 at 6:24 am

I could not agree more with this statement. Certainly we must strive to digitize and share our resources, but this is being carried out in a disjointed fashion. Before we bombard the world with all things technical (e.g. analytical information, treatment history, examination reports, etc.) it behooves us to make sure our audiences clearly understand what our profession does and represents. Unless a graduate art history student understands how to interpret a digital x-radiograph, then we are missing an important point while we are uploading hundreds of digital x-radiographs (aside from preservation purposes which of course is essential). We are gearing up to present ourselves as transparent and accessible (even though we do not yet agree as a field on these matters) to a world that is barely able to recognize our profession and interpret our work. Small efforts are being made to tackle this problem but more should be done if we are to solicit future funding and support for such large scale projects.

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Kristin deGhetaldi September 9, 2015 at 6:36 am

Not only is this true within our own field but some of our sister fields (e.g. museum studies) are repeating some of the digital endeavors that conservation has already accomplished. The key word here is “redundant.” This is partially due to the fact that we are a “low profile” field. I do not have a suggestion on how to tackle this problem but only mean to raise awareness of it. There are now several “mirror” sites for collections care, historic pigments, and other topics. What is interesting is that many of these duplicate sites are being funded by the same foundations/donors. This means that the present conservation online resources are not always being effectively used or introduced to members in our sister fields (e.g. art history, science). There is limited funding across the board for these types of initiatives and such redundancy stifles growth and collaboration within the humanities. Perhaps the appointed Leader within AIC who is meant to tackle these issues can establish an annual/semi-annual dialogue with major funders who continue to support the digital humanities. This individual can ask to act as an independent consultant or attend board meetings to represent the membership, but more importantly what the membership has already accomplished across the digital landscape.

Reply to Kristin deGhetaldi
Suzanne Davis September 22, 2015 at 10:11 pm

I don’t disagree with anything that is said here or in the paragraph above, but I wonder if other national professional organizations feel the need to ride herd on the issue. For instance, although archaeology is arguably an incredibly complex field that uses digital data like crazy, I don’t see the AIA or similar organizations trying to coordinate and drive efforts on this front. They are led, instead, by practitioners in the field. Are there existing models that AIC can look to when trying to design such an effort?

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Barbara Reeve September 25, 2015 at 6:41 am

IIC should be part of this leadership forum.

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Brenda Bernier September 22, 2015 at 9:49 pm

Great idea! Please watch the phrase “coordinated digitization strategies” if “coordinated digital strategies” is the intention. Digitization implies imaging or reformatting of analog materials — which could happen, but much less frequently.

Reply to Brenda Bernier
eden October 23, 2015 at 12:41 am

The candidate should have social media experience as well.

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