ITP 2019 Planning with BM Department Colleagues!
Written by Claire Messenger, International Training Programme Manager
Yesterday we had our first meeting to begin planning for the ITP summer programme 2019 and were delighted to be joined by colleagues from the departments of Ancient Egypt and Sudan; Africa, Oceania and the Americas; Asia; Coins and Medals; Conservation; Greece and Rome; and the Middle East.
Currently our colleagues are looking at their projects and resources for the summer to see which countries, institutions and individuals will be the best ‘fit’ for the next ITP. For next summer we are particularly keen to think about how the next cohort will fit within the network to offer the best potential for support and collaboration to all fellows.
To help with this, Jessica has worked on presenting the details of previous ITP fellows in such as way as so we can also consider the patterns and distributions of the ITP network from 2006 onwards. For example, Jess provided details of the alumni’s current role profiles so we could look across the years and see the job descriptions of our fellows. Did you know for instance that we have had 84 curators, 28 archaeologists, 24 education specialists and 7 conservators – among many others – on the ITP so far? But of course, this leads us to another, more complicated question about what job roles actually ‘mean’ – and whether they always reflect the projects that our ITP fellows are currently working on day to day. Perhaps that is research for another day!
It has been really interesting to look at these trends and patterns and the ITP fellows biography updates have helped us to also consider when ITPers have changed roles and/or institutions and taken their skills and experiences with them to a new department, section, museum or gallery.
We will look forward to sharing the details of our participants for 2019 with you next year and we are hopeful that we will have some exciting new countries to add to our ITP global network.
Meanwhile, many thanks to all our BM colleagues for their contributions and updates yesterday and a particular ‘thank you’ to Louise Ellis-Barrett (Ann el-Mokadem Librarian in Ancient Egypt and Sudan) who brought along the most delicious cake!
Claire