Meeting a need

[troll]

A nest of archaeologists with over thirty years (full-time) field experience are seriously considering the setting up of a training company for heritage professionals, students, volunteers and members of the public.

The proposed company (along the lines of training the future of our past) would be based in a near-eastern country that is a full member of the European Union and a signatory to the Valletta Convention.

The overriding aim of the proposed company is to nurture and produce highly competent field archaeologists. It has often been said that there is a desperate need for the practical training of field staff, be they recent graduates, progressing graduates , volunteers or interested members of the public.

Primarily, the proposed company aims to address the skills gap apparent between the onset of academic studies and the beginnings of a professional career path. This little nest of archaeologists recognises the need for comprehensive and structured training supplimentary to academic endeavour.

Before putting pen to paper and leaping into the dark, we felt that the subscribers to BAJR would be the ideal community to approach for opinions, advice and ridicule!

Seriously, the BAJR community represents lifetimes of experience in a multitude of fields and specialisms and we would be very grateful for input. Just what funding opportunities are there for such endeavours? What support from Higher education providers might we expect? Would students of archaeology be willing to travel to the sunshine and palm trees of the near-east?

Its early days but we do have a blueprint that we have put together so this is not entirely a shot in the dark....with many thanks for your input in advance.

Troll:face-huh:

..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)

[knapofhowar]

i'll make a quick comment

i'm not sure how many students you will manage to wrestle away from well established digs. many unis are very active (rightly or wrongly) in trying to encourage students to go on summer excavations with their own lecturers, and they take their money with them.

so, the trick would be to get on the uni's radar as an approved dig...oh and have something that isn't your usual villa student dig for those more adventurous students

[BAJR Host]

Like ourselves in Croatia, we are starting with survey, and then try for permissions to excavate, will you have problems finding an excavation site?

For my mind, a rounded project that includes field survey, GIS, photography, topographic survey, research, test trenches (everyone loves to dig!) site drawing, illustration etc... that each year produces a product that each and every participant has taken an active role in contribution.

The opportunity to have a grounding in all the fieldskills, rather than 'just' digging another bloody villa... is a good one... Already in Croatia we are expanding skills to include buildings archaeology, environmental and also heritage/tourism synthesis

Constant development is the law of life, and a man who always tries to maintain his dogmas in order to appear consistent drives himself into a false position.
Mohandas Gandhi

[Ken Denham]

Have done this in the past Troll, may I suggest that funding could be available through the Leonardo da Vinci scheme run through the EEC. It has a specific remit to fund cross cultural visits to countries like Slovakia.

[BAJR Host]

Indeed... Grampus have excelled in this..
http://www.grampusheritage.co.uk/



Constant development is the law of life, and a man who always tries to maintain his dogmas in order to appear consistent drives himself into a false position.
Mohandas Gandhi

[chiz]

Good concept, and one that other digs would be wise to follow. If more 'training digs' had this kind of attitude and were linked in to syllabi, units and and seminars, then we'd be in a better state. Although I guess they all think that they do this already...

How long would a 'placement' be? I'd worry about whether you could get enough across to students (ie your students) in say a two week average visit to really prepare them for 'real archaeology'? When I was involved in research excavations in UK we tried to nurture 'attitude' to add to any existing 'aptitude', and give people the opportunity to develop skills at their own pace. Unfortunately most skills need more than a 'if its tuesday it must be GIS' approach, and most people can't afford to spend more than two weeks on a paying site. If you could get bursaries or funding then great and people could stay longer and then it would be seriously worthwhile. Maybe this would be best aimed at students who have already learnt the basic site skills or they will be so bombarded by new concepts that many will just turn off, or flounder.
The other problem is getting enough trainers/mentors who know what they're doing, and getting the money to pay them a decent wage. So the student/mentor ratio must be low, maybe 3:1 at the most? Bit like how we'd all like it on site. And that's expensive.
And finally, from personal experience, people go on digs for a lot of reasons, sunshine and palm trees being a fairly big one. Know your prospective users, and tailor to them. Are there enough wannabe archaeologists with a few hundred quid who want to do this? A lot of 'interested' people get quite quickly burnt out by an intensive training course, whereas someone set on being a professional digger will want more.

And is it going to be relevant to your users? I understand that the archaeology in ?Cyprus is probably great, but does it train people for wet fields in February over here working with machines etc. If you get a good reputation from units and universities then this won't matter, but without it you'll just be another foreign jolly with ideas above their station.

Good luck!

[YellowPete]

to be honest i think its important that there are independents out there in this area as much as associated and affiliated projects to industry or universities.

but there is also the issue of competition with the classic british school's around the med.

any kind of company would need to offer some serious methodological exposure with a clear case of explaining the pit falls of each given approach in a mentoring role and then a bit of baptism in fire from apprenticing.

anyways

if its to be a real gig then its goping to need to knopw the territory and have a real idea of wher they fit into the grander scheme of things on this.

but, great idea



txt is
Mike

[Ken Denham]

I was working with Grampus at the time and the students had a six week stint on excavation. I tried to run it as near as possible to the standards which would be expected in British commercial archaeology.

[Ken Denham]

Oops sorry, I should have said the standards which were expected a decade ago!

[drpeterwardle]

Troll,

A few points - things to consider

What is the size of the market?
How will what you do differ from whats on offer or how will it be better?
How will you be accredited - you say "A nest of archaeologists with over thirty years (full-time) field experience" is this 30 years each"?
How will you be able to give quality garantuees to your first paying punters?

Peter