The Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies at the University of Minnesota is is an international LGBT collection that houses over 30 000 items. Lisa Vecoli has been a Board Member for Tretter Collection for 12 years and is now the staff member of the archive. In this paper, she describes the advantages of a a Community Advisory Board to interact with LGBTI communities and society at large.
What do you think are the advantages and challenges of a Community Advisory Board? To read the full paper click on "read more". Enjoy, discuss, comment and share.
The Power of a Community Advisory Board
Lisa Vecoli
Tretter Collection
in GLBT Studies
University of
Minnesota
How do we as
heritage organizations interact with our society and with our LGBTI
communities? How do we build relationships with owners of the archival material,
how do we engender trust in our institutions as the place to store the memory?
There is not a single answer to these
questions, but I would like to provide a perspective on the power of a
community advisory board/committee to an organization as they think about the
questions. We have many organizational structures among us. For the sake of
brevity and clarity, I will address the benefits and challenges I have
experienced at a collection within a large University and encourage you to
translate this in ways that make sense to your circumstances.
For 30 years I have collected LGBT
materials. For 12 years I have been a Board member for the Tretter Collection
in GLBT Studies. For 3 years I have had the archive in my will as a
beneficiary. And for 5 months I have been the staff person for the archive. Do
not underestimate the power of a community advisory board as a recruitment
tool!
When Jean-Nickolaus Tretter moved his
personal collection into the University of Minnesota Libraries in 2000, he did
so with caution. The University has over 50,000 students on the main campus
alone. The Libraries have over 7 million combined volumes and serve over 2
million clients every year. As part of the department of Archives and Special
Collections, the Tretter Collection joined a diverse group that includes
Children’s Literature, Rare Books, Sherlock Holmes, Performing Arts, African American
Literature and dozens of others.
The Collection had grown beyond what Jean
was capable of storing and the University had resources to help preserve and
grow the archive while also making it more accessible. But would this large institution
be supportive of a GLBT archive? Would a promising relationship continue into
the future? From day one, the Tretter Collection was envisioned with a strong
Community Advisory Board.
I know that the Advisory Board has
dramatically impacted my relationship with the Collection. It is not an
exaggeration to say it is what brought me here today. I also believe it is the
foundation of the strong and beneficial relationship we currently enjoy with
the University of Minnesota.
The Collection is part of the University of
Minnesota, so the Advisory Board does not have the kinds of responsibility or
control that a Board of Directors would have over financial, staffing and other
decisions. It does have two key functions. First, the Advisory Committee serves
to connect the Collection to the community. And second, the Advisory Committee
is a built in advocacy group that holds the University accountable for their
stewardship of the Collection and promotes the Collection to the broader
community.
The Tretter Collection is constantly
working to build awareness and relationships both on campus and in the
community. We need both kinds of relationships to meet our mission. Strong
campus relationships promote use by students and faculty, and establish a
strong rationale for University support. Among the members of the Advisory
Board we seek faculty members and by rule, we include the staff person for the
GLBTA Programs Office (the campus body working to improve the campus climate
for GLBT students and staff).
Strong community relationships are also
crucial, as the community is an important source of financial support and one
of our best resources for donations of materials. The Advisory Committee is a
natural fit for people who have collections and are interested in the legacy
they leave and the preservation of their materials. Inviting collectors to
serve on the Board increases their understanding and commitment to the archive
and is one of our best solicitation techniques. We have strong board members who
have committed to gift both archival collections and financial resources. These
members have a passionate interest in the success of the Collection. They also
provide tangible evidence to the University of the value of the Collection and
the benefits of maintaining a vital archive.
The Tretter Collection is fortunate to have
one paid staff person. But there is work for many more and no organization can
afford to hire enough staff to reflect the full diversity of the LGBTI
community. A diverse and representative Advisory Committee is an excellent way
to bring in expertise from all parts of the community. We are constantly
seeking to expand our membership into areas of the LGBTI community that we are
under representing.
Diversity in our community can mean a lot
of different things. The Tretter Collection has been fortunate to have strong
Board participation from undergraduates to doctoral level scholars. This has
enriched the representation across generations and helped connect us with our
University student users. We have also been fortunate to have strong
participation from the transgender community and some communities of color.
Beyond the usual diversity categories, many
of us would also benefit from skills and knowledge, such as fundraising,
corporate connections and the ability to produce a newsletter. Asking community
members with these skills to join the Board can be an excellent overture. Our
experience has been that sometimes they join. Others have offered to help with
their skill set but have chosen not to formalize their role with a Board
position. And others have been honored to be asked but have politely declined.
The Tretter Advisory Board has had some
strong successes. The Board has helped defend the collection against a decision
by the University that was not in the best interest of the Collection. Several
Board members participated in a hiring process that resulted in a much more
supportive leader being hired by the University Library. The Board has
advocated for and helped gain funding. Members watch catalogues and auctions
and recommend materials for acquisition and have organized fundraisers and
public exhibits. Board members help host the annual history display at the
Pride festival. They submit articles for the newsletter. And on occasion we
have had work days with the Board helping sort, process and re-shelve the
Collection.
A permanent Board may not be the best fit
for every organizational need. In cooperation with the Quatrefoil Library, the
Tretter Collection co-hosted the first GLBT ALMS Conference in Minneapolis in
2006. We knew that would be a very intense task, so we established a conference
planning committee with representatives of both organizations. Although the
committee disbanded with the end of the conference, the relationships developed
during this process continue to form a strong collaborative partnership to this
day.
The formation of an Advisory Board can be
modified in many ways to meet the needs of a specific organization. New and
emerging organizations may benefit from having the name of a community
leader(s) on an Advisory Board. Existing organizations that are perceived as
being shut off from parts of the LGBTI community can gain new skills and new
standing by recruiting in areas they have not yet reached. Those within large
institutions might benefit from strong advocates to help promote the
organization both internally and in the community. And those with independent
Boards of Directors might be able to use an Advisory Board to engage those who
support the organization but have no interest managing the organization in the
formal capacity.
None of this is to say that Advisory Boards
solve all of our problems. Or even that maintaining them are always easy.
Anyone who has worked with volunteers knows that there are challenges. And failing
to manage these relationships well can damage the reputation of the
organization and be worse than not doing it at all.
Among the challenges: not everyone wants to
commit the time required to serve on a board; some segments of the community
can be very hard to draw into volunteer positions; a lot of us are more
interested in collecting than raising the money to pay for the acquisitions;
and some people simply don’t play well with others.
As I shift from volunteer Board member to
the staff role, I am re-assessing the work of the Board. We are facing an
organizational transition with the retirement of our founder and the remaining
original board members beginning to step away. We have strong new community and
University members and I will be working on proactive ways to keep them engaged
and take full advantage of their expertise.
So, to return to the original questions of
how we as heritage organizations: interact with our society; build
relationships with owners of archival material; and engender trust in our
institutions as the place to store memory? With proper investment, Community
Advisory Boards have the potential to be a strategy towards each of these
goals. They can be a tool for engagement, for donor solicitation and for
accountability and trust building.
I look forward to the LGBTI ALMS conference
as an opportunity to hear from my colleagues about creative strategies they
have used with Advisory Boards and Committees.
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