I wrote 2001 in my posting on the SAA yesterday; that should have been 2002. My thanks to those who wrote me privately, explaining how SAA handles panel proposals and what it is doing to encourage greater dialog in the future. My ability to travel increasingly is circumscribed but I hope I can attend some future conferences in other cities. I wish I could have attended some of the workshops and more of the roundtables in DC (work and family obligations prevented that), where there might have been some discussions I needed to hear, but unfortunately, I only could get away to attend some of the panels. I would love to see greater representation by former government officials on SAA panels. I think some of the panels would benefit from the greater candor permitted a former official. I don't mean slamming one's successor officials, of course. Rather, I'm interested in a balanced lessons learned approach, something that can be hard to present to the public when you're an incumbent official. (Although I should note that Mike Kurtz actually touched nicely in his seminar on some past NARA practices in quantifying production, etc. And, as I mentioned, Jim Hastings and Fynnette Eaton did well in their presentations.) Obviously, current officials from NARA may feel an obligation to present a rather rosy scenario in some cases where listeners at SAA actually would benefit from a more candid examination of what works and what doesn't. And why things go the way they do. But, as I said yesterday, on a number of issues, that can be difficult to do in Washington. Perhaps I'm looking for something that just isn't possible. I still think we need a mix of present and former officials and private sector representatives in some key discussions. But, I'm not convinced that I'm the right person to persuade people that this is needed. I'm not very optimistic that I can persuade former officials to speak up more than they have. And share what they know. A Listserv isn't an ideal place to air out some of the things I'm interested in. A conference such as SAA might not be, either. Anyway, I have to give this whole communities of practice thing some more thought. Thanks to the couple of people who took time to reply to me privately! Maarja ________________________________________________________________________ Check out AOL.com today. Breaking news, video search, pictures, email and IM. All on demand. Always Free. A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org. For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp. To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] In body of message: SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname *or*: UNSUB ARCHIVES To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask] Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html Problems? Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>