IfA - A Chartered Institute

[kevin wooldridge]

I agree with Dino. I like the idea of being a chartered archaeologist but I want the organisation that sets the standard to have teeth and at track record in its commitment to all members of that profession (diggers on their first contract as much as long serving managers of super units). Does the IFA have this yet? (please quote examples in detail).

Don't know how many members the IfA has at the moment and can't be arsed to look it up but say its 3000 or so. How many of those members are long serving managers of 'super-units'? Err....maybe (extending the definition of managers to its extreme) 100. But everyone who is a corporate member of the IfA is entitled to vote. So how come the 'grunts' who make up the remaining 97% of IfA members have never risen up and changed the organisation into the type of body its many critics have suggested it ought to be? Maybe the answer to that tells us a lot about British archaeology and UK archaeologists......Trowelfodder's suggestion of starting from scratch might be one way to go, but wouldn't it be largely the same people rejoining and recreating the IfA much in the form it presents at the moment. The organisation does not exist in any form of description independent of its members. Its commitment is first and foremost to its members and through them to the profession.

I have never really understood the logic of suggesting that a membership organisation like the IfA should have teeth and then refusing to join because you don't agree with or happen to like its members!!