March 4, 2024—In the spring of 2023, the Section Health Assessment Working Group launched a member-wide survey to better understand the ways in which members engage with SAA sections and to gather ideas about other models of communities of practice. This survey, which closed on April 30, 2023, is a component of a multi-year initiative to assess sections’ health and their effectiveness in meeting member needs.
Four hundred and forty-nine respondents provided insight through this survey. Key findings from the survey include:
- 75 percent of respondents were receptive to the idea of consolidating sections. They recognized that consolidating leadership would help with capacity but also firmly indicated that the primary value of sections was their niche areas of coverage.
- 86 percent of respondents indicated that they would be receptive to transitioning less active sections into discussion groups. However, respondents raised questions about the process and the qualifiers that would prompt this transition, and how a discussion group could transition back if its membership ever desired to do so.
- SAA Connect is a point of frustration. Respondents indicated frustration with the siloing of conversations and the common practice of cross-posting on section email lists.
Since issuing and internally reviewing the results of the survey, the Section Health Assessment Working Group presented verbal updates at every Council meeting and led Council liaisons through a series of activities. From May through June 2023, Council liaisons completed preliminary section assessments based on compliance with the SAA governance requirements. Council liaisons reached out to section leadership if a section was not in compliance with governance requirements to discuss next steps for the section.
As described in the Council agenda item for July 2023, Council voted on transitioning the following sections:
- Archival Educators Section (Former Liaison: Derek Mosley; Current Liaison: Michelle Ganz) – Recommendation: Transition to a discussion group
- Latin American and Caribbean Cultural Heritage Archives Section (Former Liaison: Derek Mosley; Current Liaison: Selena Ortega-Chiolero) – Recommendation: Discontinue
- Government Records Section (Liaison: Krystal Appiah) and Local Government Records Section (Liaison: Jasmine Jones) – Recommendation: Merge
- Women’s Collections Section (Liaison: Krystal Appiah) – Recommendation: The Women’s Collections Section was initially recommended by the liaison and voted on by Council to merge. Upon further discussion with the Council liaison, it was decided that the Section would transition to a discussion group.
- Military Archives Section (Former Liaison: Rachel Winston; Current Liaison: Selena Ortega-Chiolero) – Recommendation: Military Archives was initially recommended by the liaison and voted on Council to transition to a discussion group. Based on further investigation to clarify a discrepancy, this decision has been overturned and this section will not transition.
- Women Archivists Section (Former Liaison: Rachel Winston; Current Liaison: Michelle Ganz) – Recommendation: The Women Archivists Section was initially identified as a possible group to merge with the Women’s Collections Section. However, since the Women’s Collections Section will be transitioning to a discussion group, Council determined that the Women Archivists Section would not transition at this time.
- Human Rights Archives Section (Former Liaison: Stephen Curley; Current Liaison: Conor Casey) – Recommendation: Transition to a discussion group
- Security Section (Former Liaison: Stephen Curley; Current Liaison: Conor Casey) – Recommendation: Merge
SAA Council will be working with section leadership to learn more about concerns and areas to support long-term health and sustainability of current sections over the coming months. This is a follow-up to the first-phase assessment of sections and their meeting of governance requirements. Council liaisons will be working with their assigned sections for which a decision to transition was made. This will happen over the course of this current fiscal year. The Section Health Assessment Working Group will submit a report to Council, based on information they've received, with recommendations of next steps.
Please direct any questions or comments related to this report to SAACouncil@archivists.org. In the subject line, please use: Section Health Assessment Overview 2023.
Read the full executive summary of the Section Health Assessment Survey here.
