Present: Suzanne Freeman, Chair; Liz Ginno, past-Chair; Jeanne Brown, liaison; Penney De Pas, Headquarters; Paula Epstein; Gina Kaiser; Melissa McDonald; Lynell Morr; Anne Ross; Stephanie Sigala Absent: Christine Bunting
At the meeting, the incoming and outgoing members of the committee discussed the following topics:
CHAPTER MEMBERS: Penney De Pas informed the group that two-thirds to three-quarters of the data on chapter members has been entered into the membership database; information on the remaining four chapters will be entered shortly. Headquarters has sent out membership solicitations to 219 prospective members.
NON-RENEWING MEMBERS: 310 members have yet to renew, which represents an approximate 1.92% decline overall. Instead of a letter from the Membership Committee, Stephanie Sigala suggested that the Regional Representatives contact these members through the various chapters in their region and send the results to the Executive Board.
MEMBERSHIP FORM: The committee discussed adding the SAH and MLA to the form and agreed that the NARC committee's suggestion to add a space for the indication of institutional memberships, with a possible discount on membership fees or conference registration fees.
AFFINITY GROUPS: Penney De Pas will supply the chair with the associations that appear in the "Other" category on the membership form, so that the committee may identify other affinity groups that either Headquarters or the committee can contact to find out the cost of their mailing lists. Penney will also supply the group with the cost of printing the ARLIS/NA brochures.
LIBRARY SCHOOLS: The committee suggested sending out mailings to library schools with art programs identified at post-conference. They are in favor of encouraging a student travel award.
BUSINESS MEMBERS: Headquarters will provide the committee with a list of vendors who are not ARLIS/NA members for a mailing. The committee recommended consideration of offering an honorary recognition -- possible automatic membership -- to the large contributors to the conference.
MENTOR PROGRAM: The committee discussed at length its role in a recent program, with the following results: Headquarters will send the names of the 31 conference attendees who requested a mentor to the committee, sorted geographically and then by expressed interest or need. The committee will contact these people by telephone, feeling that personal contact is of primary importance, and will ascertain their needs. Using the list of ARLIS/NA members who expressed interest in serving as a mentor, the committee will try to match appropriate mentors with those who seek mentoring. At the Philadelphia conference, the committee suggested a booth at Registration where people seeking a mentor at the conference could register and express their specific interests. The chair will attempt to match the registrants with suitable ARLIS/NA members.
ARLIS-L: Anne Ross suggested that the committee consider employing ARLIS-L as a way to reach non-ARLIS/NA members who are regularly using the listserve. Biannual or quarterly announcements of notable events, benefits for members would be possible topics of interest, as would pre-conference offerings. Stephanie Sigala agreed to the proposal that Art documentation's Table of Contents be posted to ARLIS-L, probably at the draft stage, to advertise this substantial membership benefit to non-member ARLIS-L list users.
The committee agreed generally that mass mailings are frequently not worth the return.
Finally, the committee defined its role as a sort of "think tank," which will come up with ideas that either the committee can implement or that can be passed on to the Executive Board with recommendations on the appropriate group(s) for implementation.
Suzanne Freeman
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
sfreeman@vmfa.state.va.us