Carnegie Museum in the news

Experts: Carnegie missing out on research opportunities with skeleton crew

This article is making the rounds on the vertpaleo list server, and I thought I would post the link here in case you might have not seen it. It makes one point that is really sticking out in my mind:

"Funding agencies will not give money to an institution that isn't investing in its research," said Jody Martin, chief of the division of invertebrate studies at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, which also is struggling to balance its staffing while balancing its budget. "If you're not serious, why should they give you money?"

Such a GREAT point!! I only wish more museums and administrations realized this! I can't count the number of times I have heard about someone leaving a position at a museum (or the museum loosing someone due to death, ect...) and the position never being filled, the position being filled but only temporarily, or the positions money being absorbed and used for other purposes. All of these things suck! In the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology there are over 500 student members right now. And all of these students (myself at one time) assume/think/hope that they are going to be able to get a job in typically a) an academic setting or b) a museum. If museums keep up this behavior of not filling positions what are all of these future paleontologist going to be doing with themselves...... (I hear Don Prothero addresses this in his newest book - Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs - which I have not had a chance to see yet, but I look forward to it!).

© ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster