<div dir="ltr">Dear Kirsten,<div><br></div><div>The Division of Fishes, Museum of Southwestern Biology has been the main repository of southwestern desert fishes for both state and federal agencies. These collections come from long-term monitoring projects, habitat restoration studies, life history studies, and various aquatic systems studies. Over the years, we have received funding for curation and data management of both contemporary and historical collections in MSB fishes. </div><div><br></div><div>To that end, it has been my responsibility to make sure that in return, beyond curation and data management, agency biologists receive "products"---they get something back for their funding. These "products" include such things as access to an organized digital library of field notes (ca. 80,000 pages) and "clean"-<i>Photoshopped</i>- pdfs of field notes, an electronic catalog and georeferenced specimen localities for mapping, inter-agency communication via a good accession protocol (electronic and hard files), research and field support in the form of finding and providing supplies (requisitioning supplies can be harder for state and federal agencies), lab work space, lab and field assistance (well paid student employees), relevant background data prior to field excursions, genetic archives and resources, etc. There is a lot of appreciation for these services and products over time; asking for support gets easier.</div><div><br></div><div>Over the past 25 years, the MSB Division of Fishes has received most of its funding from US Fish and Wildlife-area office, New Mexico Dept. Game and Fishes, and the US Bureau of Reclamation. Our operating budget from the University has been too small for the types of things we want to accomplish with these collections. For major upgrades, we have received NSF biological collections support and pre-disaster mitigation funding from FEMA for shelving upgrade but the ongoing agency support (I call it my "bread and butter" funding) has been invaluable. </div><div><br></div><div>So, instead of "charging" for specimen accessions, see if your <u>main</u> contributors will "fund" your activities as a museum. The trick is to "give back" in the form of museum support for their research: logistical, space, access. </div><div><br></div><div>Best, Lex Snyder</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Oct 30, 2015 at 6:55 AM, Kirsten Nicholson <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:norops@gmail.com" target="_blank">norops@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="ltr">My museum is looking to change its policies in light of changes coming down the pipe from NSF. As I understand things, currently NSF funded projects require a "data management plan" which is variously implemented by investigators, but part of which is a requirement to deposit their specimens and data somewhere that can be publicly accessed. Coming down the pipe (I hear in the next year) are more rigorous requirements for the deposition of the specimens (must be a curated collection) and they will allow/require (not clear on this part) lines of funding to be included that will offset the costs of curating all of these new collections. <div><br></div><div>Right now, like most places, we charge nothing for acquisitions, but we're also pretty much out of space, there are those in the university who do not see our value and thus our budget has plummeted, and yet we're trying to push forward to acquire more space and or a new building. Our director got excited about these new changes coming down the pipe so that we can charge to help us offset the costs of curating, but he's wanting to push this point NOW with researchers here on campus. I fear that doing so will just encourage them to deposit their specimens in other museums and not ours because it'll cost them nothing to do so.</div><div><br></div><div>So I'm wondering if anybody out there is already charging and if so, how much, and how many museums are doing this or preparing to do this?</div><div><br></div><div>Thanks for any thoughts you have,</div><div><br></div><div>Kirsten <span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br><div><font face="'times new roman', serif" style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)" color="#006600">Kirsten E. Nicholson, <span>Ph</span>.D<br><br><i><font size="1">Assoc. Prof. Biology and Curator of Natural History<br>Dept. of Biology Museum of Cultural and Natural History<br>217 Brooks Hall 103 Rowe Hall<br>Central Michigan Univ. Central Michigan University <br>Mt. Pleasant, MI 48859 Mt. Pleasant, MI 48859<br><a href="tel:989-774-3758" value="+19897743758" target="_blank">989-774-3758</a> <a href="tel:989-774-3829" value="+19897743829" target="_blank">989-774-3829</a></font></i></font><i><font size="1"><span style="background-color:rgb(0,0,0)"><font color="#336666" face="'times new roman', serif"><b><br></b></font><br></span><br></font></i><br><br><br><br><br><br></div>
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<br></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div>*****************************************************</div><div>Alexandra M Snyder</div><div>Collections Manager-Fishes<br></div>Museum of Southwestern Biology<div>MSC01-2020 </div><div><br></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(243,243,243)"><font color="#0000ff">Physical address for FedEx and UPS</font></span></div><div><font color="#0000ff">Bldg.83 Room 204, 302</font><span style="color:rgb(0,0,255)"> Yale Blvd NE</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">University of New Mexico</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">Albuquerque NM 87131 USA</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">PH.505.277.6005</span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__msb.unm.edu_&d=AwMFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=CLFZJ3fvGSmDp7xK1dNZfh6uGV_h-8NVlo3fXNoRNzI&m=8n7gQCblBNqXyDe2LZJeEQbx8NGQSXsAOTVnK6VYtUM&s=JTgREICfMzJ0jusdO9ydIWncaZBtOGVgAHOIktYt8Pc&e=" target="_blank">http://msb.unm.edu/</a><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><br></span></div></div></div></div></div>
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