Reposted from Abigail Manning

Dear Thriver,

As we step into December, I invite you to check in with yourself. This season has a way of nudging us inward to look at who we’ve become and where we’re heading next. For those of us who are wired to push hard and show up strong, our courage often looks like nonstop drive.
This month, I encourage you to pair that drive with compassion for yourself to:

Think = Choose thoughts that fuel hope.
Say = Promise yourself rest and refuel.
Do = Empower yourself by giving to others.

This holiday season, give yourself permission to restore your energy, realign with what matters, and step into the new year with courage, strength, and confidence ... from the inside out.

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Reposted from NSCC

Northern States Conservation Center 

Collections Caretaker eNewsletter

2026 Course Schedule Update

Welcome to the Collections Caretaker e-Newsletter from Northern States Conservation Center. the newsletter is designed to bring you content that is pertinent to situations we all encounter in our museum and archives work. Feel free to let us know what topics you would like to see featured in Collections Caretaker or even contribute and article.

March

MS002: Collection Protection - Are you Prepared? March 9 to 13, 2026

MS101: Introduction to Museums March 16 to April 10, 2026

MS104: Introduction to Collections Preservation March 9 to April 10, 2026

July

MS204 Materials for Storage and Display July 6 to 31, 2026

MS 207: Collections Management: Cataloging Your Collection July 6 to 31, 2026

MS210: Integrated Pest Management for Museums, Libraries and Archives July 6 to August 14, 2026

MS 267: Museum Ethics July 6 to 31, 2026 

MS253: Disaster Preparation and Recovery October 5 to 30, 2026

MS 262: Moving Collections October 5 to 30, 2026 

Buy-In: Getting All of the Staff to Support Preservation

Ever wonder how you can get the rest of your museum's staff to understand and support preservation of the collections? This short course is for you!

To get anything done in your museum, you often need to get other staff to support the idea. All too often, preservation is left to one or two staff members and others believe it doesn’t apply to them. For example, it is hard to successfully implement a pest management plan without full staff support. Everyone must buy into the notion of preservation. But how? Readings will introduce some ideas and participants in this course will brainstorm with your instructor about what works, what might work – and what doesn’t.

To find out more join Samantha Hunt-Duran for MS008 Buy-In: Getting All of the Staff to Support Preservation starting February 2, 2026.

Collection Protection - Are you Prepared?

Does your museum have an Emergency Operation (Disaster) Plan? This course will get you started making a plan for your museum.

Disaster planning is overwhelming. Where do you start? Talk to Amanda about how to get going. Use the checklist to determine your level of preparedness. What do you already have in place? Are you somewhat prepared? What can you do next? Help clarify your current state of readiness and develop future steps to improve it.

Join Amanda Benson for MS002 Collection Protection - Are you Prepared? starting March 9, 2026 to learn more and begin writing your Emergency Operation Plan.

An Early Bird Discount is available for anyone who signs up for a full-length course from museumclasses.org 30 days prior to the start of that course.

Sign up for a full-length course up to 30 days prior to its start and save 20%!

For our course list or to sign up: http://www.collectioncare.org/course-list

To take advantage of this discount, you must enter coupon code EARLYBIRD at checkout at collectioncare.org

Early Bird Discount for February Courses is January 3, 2026

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Reposted from AAM

Event Information

From Numbers to Narratives: Exploring the Annual Snapshot Survey       Date Thurs. December 18, 2025
Time- 2:00 pm to 3:00 pm Eastern Time

This year’s Snapshot Report sheds light on the challenging year the museum field has experienced, as well as the bright spots that offer opportunities for innovation and changing traditional models. Join us on December 18 for an engaging webinar exploring the findings with Carys Kunze, Research & Data Manager for AAM, Elizabeth Merritt, Vice President, Strategic Foresight & Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums, AJ Goehle, CEO at Luci Creative and Jennifer Ortiz, Director at the Utah Historical Society. Together, they’ll dive into key findings and discuss what they mean for the museum field. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear expert perspectives and spark meaningful conversation about trends shaping our sector.

Its FREE to register

Login or create your profile at the Register button above.

Confirm your contact details and proceed through the check out process. You will not be charged.

After submitting your order, you will receive an order confirmation number – you are registered!

You will receive both an order confirmation email from AAM and an invite containing the event details to add to your calendar.

If you have not received your confirmation email or invite, please check your email’s spam folder before reaching out to AAM.

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Reposted from AAM

2026 AAM Annual meeting and MuseumExpo

Where: Philadelphia May 20-23, 2026

Registration is Now Open

Super Early Bird Registration is Now Open

Register early for the best rates and first pick of experiential workshops in Philadelphia’s museums. Don’t wait - these rates end January 16.

Party with Your People

The AAM Party @ The Franklin Institute

The AAM Party is the single biggest event of the conference, celebrating all the new connections, insights, and inspiration you’ve experienced thus far. This party is one you won’t want to miss!

Connect Event @ The Philadelphia Art Museum

Spend your evening at this unique party designed to help you celebrate with new friends and create even more connections through engaging activities at the museum.

Experiential Workshop Tickets On Sale

Experiential workshops take place at Philadelphia’s museums, making learning immersive. Get your first choice on tickets when you register early, including:

Time Travel with Collections: Join the Mutter Museum staff to explore different creative methods for imagining historical encounters from multiple perspectives and for cultivating historical thinking skills.

When Your House Museum Tries to Sink: Learn how Battleship New Jersey moved its entire museum 6 miles downriver and what the staff is doing next.

Ancient Alcohol Tour and Tasting: Explore how our ancestors partied like it was 5000 BCE with an unconventional (and boozy) journey back in time at the Penn Museum.

Know You’re In?

If you know you’re planning to attend AAM 2026 but aren’t ready to register yet, you can still plan ahead!

The schedule-at-a-glance is now available to help you plan your time in Philadelphia. Book your room in the official housing block! These hotels are providing exclusive discounted rates for our attendees, but space is limited so book early to get your preferred hotels and rates.

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Reposted from AMM

AMM 2026 Conference
Chicago,IL

What's with these new idea generation sessions?

For AMM 2026, we are inviting museum professionals and consultants in our network to help us facilitate idea generation sessions and speed-networking style idea gathering sessions.

Why? To help museum people connect around some common challenges and, through that process, walk away with lots of actionable ideas. If you have experience or expertise in any of these areas and/or simply love to lead brainstorming or networking activities, we encourage you to apply! Do you know a thing or two about motivating visitors, members, and social media followers to get more involved? Apply to lead Idea Generation Session: From Follower to Friend!

Have you had success with recruiting and developing volunteers? Apply to lead Idea Generation Session: Volunteer Engagement!

Have you found creative ways to reduce costs for any aspect of museum operations? Apply to lead Idea Gathering/Speed-Sharing: Mission Delivery on a Dime! Do you have experience in development, and making asks of individuals in particular? Apply to lead Idea Gathering/Speed-Sharing: Ambitious Asks That Worked!

Are you interested in or have personal experience with how museums are responding to attempts to censor or defund their work? Apply to lead Idea Gathering/Speed-Sharing: Fight or Flight!

Facilitators will have all the perks of a presenter (i.e. discounted registration rate) and collaborate with AMM on their assigned brainstorming or speed-sharing sessions.

Learn more about all of this year's presentation opportunities, find proposal tips, and review instructions in the Call for Proposals. Submit your idea by January 23.

About the Theme - We Hold These Truths

This year's theme is a nod to America's 250th, of course, but it's also an exploration of the "truths" that we hold steadfast in the work of museums or that we are challenging in order to advance. Proposals with connections to the theme are ideal, but not required. All ideas are welcomed!

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Reposted from Majestic Collaborations

New Skill Development Opportunity Webinar: From Day-to-Day to Disaster: Venues Shaping Local Preparedness

When: December 18, 2025

3:30pm EST

This webinar equips indie venue professionals, operators, and staff with practical tools and knowledge to advance from routine operations to disaster readiness, positioning their venues as leaders in local preparedness efforts. Attendees will discover actionable strategies for empowering teams, activating venues as community hubs, and strengthening readiness for emergencies of all sizes. Explore industry-leading resources—including site-specific assessment tools, funding strategies, and professional development opportunities—while connecting with a network dedicated to building resilient arts communities.

Participants will leave with checklists and a clear roadmap for integrating preparedness and well-being into their venue’s core operations. We will be sharing a condensed toolkit from the forthcoming

ReadyWhen Foundations in Events and Emergency Operations 10 hour Certificate

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The Grave Robber-The Biggest Stolen Artifacts Case in FBI History and the Bureau’s Quest to Set Things Right
by Tim Carpenter

The unbelievable true story of how one man stole tens of thousands of priceless artifacts and human remains from around the world---and the FBI’s massive undertaking to set things right.
The Grave Robber-About the Book

The unbelievable true story of how one man stole tens of thousands of priceless artifacts and human remains from around the world—and the FBI’s massive undertaking to set things right. In The Grave Robber, Tim Carpenter, former FBI Lead Investigator on the Art Crime Team, recounts one of the most extraordinary and unsettling cases in the history of art theft. Over the course of five decades, a lone graverobber accumulated an illicit trove of over 42,000 artifacts from cultures across the globe, including Native American, Haitian, Chinese, and others. The stolen items included nearly 500 ancestral remains, carefully looted from sacred burial sites and cultural heritage locations. Carpenter’s team, driven by an unwavering commitment to justice, embarks on a harrowing journey to track down this elusive criminal and uncover the full scope of the theft. What they find is nothing short of staggering: an illegal collection of immense historical and cultural significance, hidden away in a Midwestern home.

Part true crime narrative, part procedural, The Grave Robber offers a gripping, behind-the-scenes look at the meticulous work involved in tracking down one of the most prolific art thieves in history. Carpenter takes readers inside the FBI’s groundbreaking investigation, detailing the complex challenges of recovering stolen cultural artifacts and the legal and moral dilemmas of repatriating them to their rightful communities. Along the way, the Bureau’s efforts to confront these crimes evolve, as they come to terms with the deep historical wounds caused by such looting—especially the desecration of Native American graves and ancestral sites. With rare access to both the investigation and the impacted communities, Carpenter’s narrative sheds light on the lengths the FBI and tribal representatives go to in their pursuit of justice.

As the case progresses, the narrative expands from a tense pursuit of a criminal to a larger reckoning with history and cultural heritage. The repatriation of these sacred objects and remains to their rightful owners becomes an act of restoration—not just of physical artifacts, but of dignity and respect for the communities whose ancestors were so violently wronged. The story of The Grave Robber is one of redemption and transformation: for the FBI, which redefined its approach to cultural crimes, and for the tribes and cultures who finally see justice done. This riveting account of a stolen past and the quest to make it right reads like a thriller, but it is ultimately a story of healing, responsibility, and the importance of preserving history for future generations.

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Reposted from Performing Arts Readiness

The Performing Arts Readiness (PAR) project’s new article, “Advancing Emergency Planning for the Performing Arts with Low-Cost AI Tools,” offers practical guidance for using affordable AI subscriptions to strengthen emergency planning. Building on our earlier piece about free tools, this article shows how low-cost plans can improve workflows for Risk Assessment, Crisis Communication, and Business Continuity planning, with clear advice on privacy, accuracy, and responsible use. It discusses using features such as Custom Instructions, Projects and team workspaces, and Deep Research. It also provides adaptable prompt examples you can use immediately in planning sessions or tabletop exercises. Written by Steve Eberhardt, PAR Project Coordinator, the article is designed for small and mid-sized organizations that want deeper planning support without enterprise budgets.

As PAR concludes on December 31, we will send details on how to continue accessing recordings of our webinars and the other assets found on our website.

Your friends at the Performing Arts Readiness project,

PAR@Lyrasis.org

www.PerformingArtsReadiness.org

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Reposted from Tim Richardson

Preventing Toxicity: A Leadership Lesson from an Apple Pie Disaster

Starting in the late 1990s, I began making an award-winning El Niño Apple Pie at Thanksgiving. It was a recipe I found in USA Today in October 1998. The first time I made it, I picked the apples from a tree in front of my grandparents’ mountainside home. I made the crust from scratch and topped it with a cranberry oatmeal streusel under the watchful eye of my grandmother.

The Power of a Simple Metaphor

One year, though, I made a toxic apple pie. Let me explain. My cousin had stayed at our family home a few weeks before Thanksgiving and, unbeknownst to me, spilled something in the oven while cooking. To clean it, she used an industrial-strength product – truly heroic in power – but didn’t properly wipe it down or rinse the residue. When I baked my pie, all that cleaner odor was absorbed into my beautiful culinary creation. When my niece tasted it, she immediately dubbed it “the toxic apple pie.” It’s been a running family joke ever since.

Toxicity Doesn’t Start Big—It Starts Unnoticed

Lately, I’ve been thinking about that pie and how easily the whole situation could have been avoided if the toxic cleaner had simply been cleaned up quickly. It’s a lot like toxic relationships. Maybe you’ve had one. Toxic relationships at work rarely appear out of nowhere. They’re usually the result of deeper organizational issues that go unaddressed (just like the unseen mess left in the oven). Some of the most common causes include:

• Poor communication

• Misunderstandings

• Unresolved conflict

• Jealousy among teammates

• Resentment

The effects of toxic relationships can be incredibly harmful to morale. They can lead to turnover, disengagement, quiet quitting, loss of productivity, chronic stress and anxiety, absenteeism, and even challenging behaviors toward customers. In extreme cases, toxicity can escalate into aggression or violence. And toxicity isn’t limited to workplaces. It can split families, damage lifelong friendships, and create deep rifts between siblings. It can lead to arguments, alienation, and even permanent separation or divorce.

Clean Up Early, Clean Up Often The solution, while not always easy, is simple:

Clean up your messes as soon as possible. Just like the oven, relationships require maintenance – before small messes turn into toxic ones. Healthy relationships at work and at home don’t require perfection. They require attention. Address small messes early. Apologize when needed. Forgive when possible. Learn from your mistakes. Do everything you can not to repeat them. And stay committed to keeping your “oven” clean so the people around you can thrive.

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ReadyWhen Foundations in Event and Emergency Operations

Pre-conference intensive for cultural venue professionals preparing for climate and disaster impacts

Museums, libraries, historic sites, and other cultural venues operate sophisticated systems for managing people, resources, and facilities—capabilities that become critical community assets during disasters. This conference, IFCPP and Majestic Collaborations are partnering to present a tactical bootcamp to earn the ReadyWhen Foundations Certificate in Event and Emergency Operations, which translates in-demand cultural properties expertise—crowd management, logistics under pressure, resource coordination, and safety planning—into frameworks cultural institutions can use to enhance both daily operations and disaster preparedness.

The classroom component of the certification will be taught in a full-day pre-conference on Sunday, April 18. Learn practical strategies for assessing your facility's resilience capacity, coordinating with emergency management partners, and positioning your institution as a community resource during crisis—unlocking new funding streams through disaster planning and emergency readiness grants. Whether you're improving safety protocols for public programs, documenting institutional capacity for funders, or exploring positioning your venue as a community resilience hub, this training builds transferable skills in logistics, accessible design, stakeholder coordination, and adaptive planning.

Come a day early to take part in an Immersive Intensive at French Quarter Festival on Saturday April 17th! Experience operations firsthand through a 3-4 hour guided tour of the festival infrastructure, featuring interviews with professionals and interactive learning activities. See how large-scale event systems function in real-time. This session fulfills the practicum requirement of the ReadyWhen Foundations Certificate in Event and Emergency Operations.

Registration opens in just a couple weeks—stay tuned!

Who should attend: Cultural property and venue staff, city officials and municipal workers, security professionals, event producers and venues, historic property managers, cultural organization directors, operations and facilities staff preparing for disruption.

Part of a broader learning program in New Orleans, April 2026—where 20 years post-Katrina, we're exploring what it means to protect cultural infrastructure in an era of accelerating disasters.