Advocacy Protocol

Regional Archival Associations Consortium Advocacy Protocol

Does your Regional have an Advocacy Issue? Do you need Advocacy-related support? Here is the protocol for RAAC representatives to request advocacy assistance from the Regional Archival Associations Consortium.

1.  Complete the Advocacy Request Form, including your contact information, what your regional needs from RAAC, and where RAAC can obtain additional information on the issue. The Chair or Chair-Elect will respond within 24 hours and arrange for a phone call. In the case that the Chair and Chair-Elect are unavailable, a Steering Committee member will serve as proxy.

2.  The RAAC Chair, Chair-Elect, and the Steering Committee will immediately discuss your issue and decide on a plan of action. The Advocacy Committee will also be invited to provide input on this discussion. If your issue is taken on, the plan of action may include help with an advocacy campaign, dissemination of communications, garnering the support of other regionals, and, if needed, contacting SAA on your regional’s behalf. The RAAC Advocacy Committee will lead this work in conjunction with the RAAC Chair and Chair-Elect. If the RAAC Steering Committee decides that your issue cannot be pursued by RAAC, you will be provided with the reason for the decision and a suggestion for an alternate course of action.

Responses to advocacy requests will be documented in RAAC Steering Committee meeting minutes, including a synopsis of the issue, rationale for the final decision, and if applicable, a brief description of the plan of action.

A list of all advocacy issues taken on by RAAC will be maintained on RAAC’s website on the Advocacy Requests page (under the Resources section).

3.  If SAA’s assistance is needed, the RAAC Chair will contact the SAA President and Executive Director. With this contact, the RAAC Chair will provide a brief (1- or 2-page) written overview of the issue that includes:

• Statement of Facts: What is the issue? Has SAA taken action on this or a similar issue in the past? If so, what was that action?

• Discussion: Why is this issue important to archives and/or archivists? Does the issue fit within the priorities outlined in SAA’s Advocacy Agenda? If so, where? If not, why should it be considered as a high priority outside of the Agenda? What are the pros and cons or implications of SAA taking a position or action (or not taking a position or action) on this issue?

• Recommendation(s): What do you recommend that SAA do? Should SAA act alone or should it seek support from one or more other organizations?

   

4. You can expect regular communication from the RAAC Chair and/or Chair-Elect. You can also expect that the Chair, Chair-Elect, and/or Advocacy Committee members will regularly update the RAAC listserv on the progress made on any advocacy campaign.

Conversely, SAA may contact RAAC via the RAAC Chair to ask for advocacy assistance. Such a request might be to send a specific message out through the RAAC representatives to their requisite organization members by email and/or social media.