Small Museums Scholarships

2019 AASLH Annual Meeting and Online Conference

Philadelphia, PA

DEADLINE: 15 May 2019

The American Association for State and Local History will hold its Annual Meeting and Online Conference in Philadelphia, PA from 28-31 August 2019. 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.

Now in its fourteenth year, AASLH’s Small Museums Committee is offering scholarships to any 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. Recipients, though, must submit a post to the AASLH blog, Big Ideas for Small Museums, 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. Application forms are available at www.aaslh.org

The deadline for applications is 15 May. The committee will email award winners by 1 June. For questions, please contact Bruce Teeple, Small Museum Scholarship Subcommittee Chair at mongopawn44@hotmail.com, or Aja Bain, AASLH Program and Publications Coordinator, at abain@aaslh.org