Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections March 2018 - 6

Society Reports
Best Practices Committee

management.

The Best Practices Committee continues to add valuable new content to the
SPNHC wiki (http://spnhc.biowikifarm.
net/wiki). We hope that the wiki will
soon begin to be the first place that
members search for best practice information before they ask for answers and
opinions via NHCOLL-L. A page on
Numbering Natural History Collections,
a topic that is regularly discussed on
NHCOLL-L, is now available. The page
includes information about numbering
systems for natural history collections.
A page on Field Preparation, which contains information about how to prepare
for fieldwork that includes collecting
specimens, is also now available.

The Citations Subcommittee is continuing to gather citations
for museum collection-related content, although contributions
continue to be limited. As a means to make gathering and
searching citations easier, the Citations Subcommittee Chair
is currently working on moving the citations database from
End Note to Zotero. Once the process is complete and the
Citations Subcommittee has reviewed, it will be released to
the wider SPNHC audience.

The American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (ASIH) Collections Committee will be partnering with
SPNHC to edit and add content to wiki pages associated with
fluid collections. A number of pages already exist that were
created as a result of a fluid collections workshop hosted at
the 2016 Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists
(JMIH).
The Best Practices Committee Co-chairs have been involved
with discussions on updates to both the SPNHC website
and the SPNHC Wikipedia page. One of the BP Co-chairs is
currently serving on the SPNHC ad hoc Website Redesign
Committee, which is working to review our current website
and make suggestions about what might be best for future
design and management. The Best Practices Committee is
also examining the sustainability of the wiki in the long term
and determining the most effective way to get committee
content online. Long-term plans will likely include more
committee involvement, including new roles of wiki liaison
for each committee. Rachael Arenstein will be reaching out
to committee chairs to coordinate discussions about possible
content that might be appropriate for the wiki and to gather
data regarding the possible effectiveness of wiki liaisons.
The Best Practices Committee is coordinating with members
of the Society for American Archaeology (SAA) to develop
a session at the 83rd Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C.
(April 11-15, 2018). This session would include a lightning
round organized around collaboration in collections care.
Hayley Singleton, a member of the Best Practices Committee,
will be representing SPNHC, and other societies/organizations will be sharing valuable cross-discipline resources and
innovative solutions for archaeology specimen care and data
6 * SPNHC Connection

Respectfully submitted,
Jessica Cundiff and Breda Zimkus, Co-chairs

Bylaws Committee
The Bylaws Committee is responsible
for the continued development of the
Society Bylaws, monitoring Society
activities to ensure agreement with
Bylaws, and for periodic updates to the
Leadership Manual of the Society.
Bylaws: numerous additional changes
have been suggested since the recent
bylaws update initiated during the Leadership Manual update
process, and these will be enacted and voted on by Council in
the near future.
Leadership Manual: work continues on updating the Leadership Manual for consistency and content, led by committee
member Laura Abraczinskas. Committee chairs and officers
as well as Executive Council have been engaged to provide
updated materials, and these are in the process of being incorporated.
Respectfully submitted,
Andrew Bentley, Chair

Conference Committee
Preparation for the 2018 joint meeting
of SPNHC and TDWG in Dunedin,
New Zealand, are proceeding well. The
conference website became available
in mid-December (spnhc-tdwg2018.
nz). The meeting will be held August
25-September 1, 2018, hosted by the
Otago Museum in collaboration with
the University of Otago. The first call
for abstracts, workshops and symposia began on December
20, 2017, and will be open until March 12, 2018. Early bird
registration is March 12-May 13; regular registration closes

http://spnhc.biowikifarm.net/wiki http://spnhc.biowikifarm.net/wiki http://www.spnhc-tdwg2018.nz http://www.spnhc-tdwg2018.nz

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections March 2018