Up next is a very specialized, very important group: the Visitor Studies Association.

The VSA, in its own words,

is today’s premier professional organization focusing on all facets of the visitor experience in museums, zoos, nature centers, visitor centers, historic sites, parks and other informal learning settings. We’re committed to understanding and enhancing visitor experiences in informal learning settings through research, evaluation, and dialogue.

There are a couple of different levels of membership: full is $100, basic is $60, and student is $30. The good news is, all three of those memberships receive the organization’s journal, Visitor Studies: Theory, Research, and Practice, as well as a bi-monthly email newsletter. The full membership gets a few more perks like a printed member directory and discounts on conferences and workshops.

The 24th annual Visitor Services Association Conference is being held in Chicago this July, and they’re very generous with financial assistance for students – check it out. At least one of the deadlines for a scholarship is coming up fast, though – March 1 – so you’ll need to hurry up if you want to take advantage of that.

They’ve got some great resources available on their website, including Evaluation Competencies, which is basically an online course for continuing education in visitor studies. It’s got a good bibliography for anyone who’s interested in learning more about being more responsive to visitors, and evaluating visitor experiences. There’s also a good collection of readings about ethical guidelines for evaluators, a good links page, and a fantastic archive of past VSA publications.

We learn a lot in our classes at Tufts about how important it is to constantly assess the impact museums have on visitors, both in the immediate and the long-term. This is an organization that’s doing great work to provide us all with more resources about best practices in that field – and who knows, it may be your calling within the museum field.

For the art historians among us: the National Art Education Association.

Here’s what the NAEA has to say about itself:

Founded in 1947, The National Art Education Association is the leading professional membership organization exclusively for visual arts educators. Members include elementary, middle and high school visual arts educators, college and university professors, researchers and scholars, teaching artists, administrators and supervisors, and art museum educators, as well as more than 45,000 students who are members of the National Art Honor Society or are university students preparing to be art educators.

We represent members in all fifty states plus the District of Columbia, U.S. Possessions, most Canadian Provinces, U.S. military bases around the world, and twenty-five foreign countries.

Mission
The National Art Education Association (NAEA) advances visual arts education to fulfill human potential and promote global understanding.

Core Values
NAEA staff and members work to support professional growth, change, and leadership through:

Mentoring
Networking and collaborating
Participating in art education conferences
Developing and disseminating exemplary resources on art education
Building a professional community by contributing our time and talents to others
Valuing our diversity and committing ourselves to equity

They have a fairly complicated grid of membership costs by state; for Massachusetts, it’s $70 for full, active membership and $30 for a student membership. For those joining us from other states, you can navigate this PDF to find out your dues. In terms of benefits, you get a fairly robust series of publications, access to a members-only section of the website that includes lesson plans and gallery activities, discounts on all sorts of things, and access to grants and other funding opportunities.

The professional development section of their website is really fantastic: access to lesson plans, all sorts of resources for the practice of art education, book and material reviews, and a mentor program. They also maintain a robust “Research” section, with reports and tools for the thoughtful analysis of art education. Like AAM, NAEA is involved in advocacy for its professional interests, and they have some good advice that goes way beyond art education and is applicable to anyone speaking for a cultural cause.

So go, check them out!

(editor’s note: we’ve made a small correction to our previous post on the AASLH; student members aren’t mailed a paper copy of History News, but they can access back issues online.)