Organization > Chapters > Greater Philadelphia > Minutes and Reports

Minutes

June 4, 1999
Bryn Mawr College

Present:

Minutes:

Joan Beaudoin convened the meeting by having everyone introduce themselves. This included an introduction of Jenni Roddi, VRA President, who was in attendance at the meeting. Jenni informed the group that the VRA Board will meet in July and will review the Greater Philadelphia Area Chapter VRA's by-laws at that time. She did not anticipate any problems in approving the by-laws.

Jenni said that groups that are just forming generally choose officers very informally. Once a chapter's by-laws are accepted, they can then go through the more formal process of electing officers. It was decided that Joan Beaudoin would serve as Chairperson and Rachel Beckwith would serve as Secretary until the by-laws were formally approved.

Joan and the group thanked Susan Shifrin and Peggy Ottens for their work over the past year in organizing the Chapter. In the past year, there have been three meetings of the Greater Philadelphia Area Chapter (June 1998, March 1999, and June 1999), and there are approximately 25 members on the list.

Joan then asked the group what they would like to do as a local chapter. Peggy said she hoped the group could be oriented toward education. Susan remarked that she would like to hold workshops and information-sharing sessions. Other suggested activities included seeing other collections, sharing administrative policies, and holding discussions on security, budget management, and the differing ways in which slide libraries fit into organizational structures.

Anne Samuel reported that she is leaving her current job at the University of the Arts in order to attend graduate school in the fall. She distributed copies of the job description and asked group members to post it in their institutions and pass on the information to any interested people.

As Anne had reported that her job was being upgraded, the group then broached the subject of job re-classification. Peggy said that the low salary of her former job was one of the reasons she left. Susan brought up the subject of the staff/faculty divide and the lack of support for staff research. The subject of criteria for hiring and retaining VRA professionals was discussed, and Jenni reminded the group that there was published criteria that had been accepted by many professional organizations, including VRA, CAA, and ARLIS. Jenni also said that the VRA's Professional Status survey results would be published in a couple of months; she suggested that we could do a local VRA survey and compare it with the national one. Susan thought that VRA professionals should be compared to junior level faculty in order to gain more support for research and higher status. Peggy wondered whether the VRA should institute some sort of accreditation process or certification like the SAA.

Jenni then asked the group whether there were issues that we would like her to bring to the national association for them to address. Some issues that were brought up included:

The meeting ended with a discussion on policy documents and access concerns. The attendees thanked Jenni Rodda for coming to the meeting.

Minutes compiled by Rachel Beckwith June 17th, 1999

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