WFFMM-NAAM Conference 2021

Standards are markers of professionalism, foster accountability, and enable good decision-making. While AAM promulgates a set of core standards that are applicable to all types of museums, there are standards, codes of ethics, and professional practices issued by museum associations representing children’s museums, railway museums, art museums, state and local history museums, zoos and aquariums, and academic museums, just to name a few. Plus, there’s the International Council of Museums’ own version as well as general museum standards issued by individual countries. This session will explain how WFFMM and NAAM, if they wanted to set auto museum-specific standards, might start the process and use AAM’s as a guideline and starting point. Drawing on her two-and-a-half decades working with AAM’s accreditation program and similar programs in other countries, AAM’s Senior Director for Standards & Excellence will share insights about the challenges and opportunities for both groups to consider if they wanted to pursue such an endeavor. Some considerations include applicability to a global set of stakeholders, qualitative vs. quantitative, resources to develop and maintain, enforceability, and relationship to membership. After hearing about AAM’s standards philosophy and model, attendees will learn of other discipline-specific standards and HeritageRail Alliance’s recent experience revising its Recommended Practices for Railway Museums. The target audiences for this session are decision-makers, leaders, and influencers from NAAM and WFFMM; and others who might want to be involved in a process of creating standards for auto museums.