IfA to be abolished and replaced by......

[P Prentice]

Academic excellence does not and should not equate to being a good field archaeologist. This will just reinforce the elitist 'us and them' perception of the IfA.

this comment has puzzled me and i must say my immediate reaction was that academic ability is part and parcel to being a good archaeologist. elitism here sounds like a dirty word but it is no different to graduates being paid more or holding better positions than non-graduates - one of the fundamental reasons for going to uni after all. elitism in this sense is exactly what chartered status would confer and if gaining means giving up some free time - welll you make that choice just as in any other profession.

[BAJR]

this comment has puzzled me and i must say my immediate reaction was that academic ability is part and parcel to being a good archaeologist. elitism here sounds like a dirty word but it is no different to graduates being paid more or holding better positions than non-graduates - one of the fundamental reasons for going to uni after all. elitism in this sense is exactly what chartered status would confer and if gaining means giving up some free time - welll you make that choice just as in any other profession.

Reasonably clear that academic ability does not make a good field archaeologist... and visa versa
I dig therefore I am

I have no academic credentials, I just do both

[P Prentice]

Reasonably clear that academic ability does not make a good field archaeologist... and visa versa
I dig therefore I am

I have no academic credentials, I just do both

but you do have academic credentials if you have written a report -methinks

[Wax]

For a small fee I will sell you some credentials: hang on a minute isn't that what this thread is all about? }

[Sikelgaita]

this comment has puzzled me and i must say my immediate reaction was that academic ability is part and parcel to being a good archaeologist. elitism here sounds like a dirty word but it is no different to graduates being paid more or holding better positions than non-graduates - one of the fundamental reasons for going to uni after all.

Maybe we should fast track some graduates directly into Project Officer positions so that they don't actually ever have to get their hands dirty. After all an understanding of how a site record has been produced is not important and in no way affects the interpretation.:face-stir:

Many of the very best archaeologists I have met do not have degrees and have no desire to write reports. This in no way lessens their qualities as archaeologists and I would trust their judgements every time over those of a career minded 'academic'. I believe that until archaeology values technical fieldwork skills as highly as academic ones the CIfA will never be representative of the industry. I may be wrong on this but my understanding of your previous posts on this subject is that you don't really want it to be representative.

My word, trying to distance yourself from lowly MIFAs already? }

frankly - yes

I think I am one of those MIfA's you would rather see the back of. }

.....elitism in this sense is exactly what chartered status would confer and if gaining means giving up some free time - welll you make that choice just as in any other profession.

Up at 5.30am, get to office by 7am, get in site vehicle, 1.5 hours travel to site, 8 hours digging in the rain, 1.5 hours travel back to office. Get home 6.30pm. Now which would I prefer, spending the evening revising diligently like a good professional archaeologist or maybe forgetting about archaeology for a few hours and have a few beers with friends or sit down to read a book that is....sacrilege....not about archaeology, before the whole cycle starts again! Archaeology is not a 'lifestyle' choice for everyone and I think this is a point that is sometimes forgotten.

[RedEarth]

Up at 5.30am, get to office by 7am, get in site vehicle, 1.5 hours travel to site, 8 hours digging in the rain, 1.5 hours travel back to office. Get home 6.30pm. Now which would I prefer, spending the evening revising diligently like a good professional archaeologist or maybe forgetting about archaeology for a few hours and have a few beers with friends or sit down to read a book that is....sacrilege....not about archaeology, before the whole cycle starts again! Archaeology is not a 'lifestyle' choice for everyone and I think this is a point that is sometimes forgotten.

I only hope you are getting paid or getting TOIL for all that overtime. Perhaps if the latter you could use some of that time to do some of what PP was talking about.

[Sikelgaita]

I only hope you are getting paid or getting TOIL for all that overtime. Perhaps if the latter you could use some of that time to do some of what PP was talking about.

I might start out with good intentions but there are always more interesting things to do than work in my own time. Therefore I think if it were an exam I would just wing it, if I had to write a dissertation that would be no more MIfA for me.

[P Prentice]

I may be wrong on this but my understanding of your previous posts on this subject is that you don't really want it to be representative.



I think I am one of those MIfA's you would rather see the back of. }

it is currently possible for amateurs to gain mifa. i dont think this is helpful to our profession - do you?
having gained mifa as a digger i am as aware as anyone else of the skills and commitment field workers often have but i dont think i called myself an archaeologist until i started writing reports and i dont think i properly understood the value of the fieldwork i was doing until then either. clearly this could imply that i was not such a good digger but i would say i became one when i started writing reports. i have seen many good diggers and many poor diggers and i see lots of reports written by people who obviously did not spent enough time in the field thinking about what they were doing because their reports are frankly crap. i also see curators who are very good at issuing briefs and checking wsi's but cant see whats what when they monitor a site because they never spent enough time digging.
i want good archaeologists to be recognised by the extent of their knowledge and skills becuase currently they are not.
your average day sounds tough. one of the reasons you have to do those ours is the unregulated nature of our industry which allows absolutely anybody to bid for work, anywhere and employ people on absolutely any p&c they can get away with. the ifa attempted to raise working conditions but eventually gave up because too many non-ifa operators undercut ro's by paying below minima ..............

[Sikelgaita]

Thanks, really thought provoking.

it is currently possible for amateurs to gain mifa. i dont think this is helpful to our profession - do you?

I don't see why it is unhelpful. Plenty of local societies run community projects. Amongst them are some very experienced amateur archaeologists whose skills and experience (both in the field and reporting) far outweigh those of some MIfA's I have met. I might even take this one step further and (controversially) argue that this could also be applied to some of the experienced metal-detectorists out there. Might not allowing reputable metal-detectorists into the IfA help build bridges between the two communities?

..... i see lots of reports written by people who obviously did not spent enough time in the field thinking about what they were doing because their reports are frankly crap.

How many companies offer training in report writing to first time report writers?

An archaeologist, keen and eager and wanting a career in the job they love, is given the opportunity to write a report. That report takes longer than the tight budgetary constraints allow. It requires a great deal of editing. Tut, tut, tut say the managers not good enough. Tut, tut, tut, say the curators and consultants, not good enough. No more opportunities for that budding report writer and so they remain a digger and unable to reach that elusive CIfA benchmark. As with fieldwork, report writing improves with experience.

i also see curators who are very good at issuing briefs and checking wsi's but cant see whats what when they monitor a site because they never spent enough time digging.

I would apply this statement equally to archaeological consultants.

Partly I believe this happens because, when looking to appoint, Local Authorities and consultancies sometimes tend to see BA or MA after someones name and think that these are meaningful indicators that the person being considered for the post is a good archaeologist, even if they have only limited fieldwork experience. Maybe that university essay they brought along as proof of their written skills clinched it. Why did that candidate with 10 years experience in the field not supply some wriiten evidence. Most archaeology degrees are Bachelor of Arts yet the majority of the skills required in the field are practical and technical with some physical thrown in. To me it seems that this dichotomy is central to the problem. The CIfA seems to recognise academic achievement above all else yet for many archaeologists they spend their time learning and improving a different skill set.

i want good archaeologists to be recognised by the extent of their knowledge and skills becuase currently they are not.

We are in agreement on this.

your average day sounds tough.

Apologies, my experience in archaeology is a bit more wide ranging than just fieldwork. A little bit of artistic license was applied (at the present time at least) but I am sure that this working day is not far from the truth for many diggers, supervisors and Project Officers.

one of the reasons you have to do those ours is the unregulated nature of our industry which allows absolutely anybody to bid for work, anywhere and employ people on absolutely any p&c they can get away with. the ifa attempted to raise working conditions but eventually gave up because too many non-ifa operators undercut ro's by paying below minima ..............

I think that undercutting in archaeology is a much more complex issue than just RAO vs Non RAO. Undercutting comes in many forms, many are subtle. For instance the definition of a workplace. I would be interested to know how your employer defines your place of work and then ask why some RAO's seem to interpret the definition of 'place of work' differently for diggers.

[GnomeKing]

(due to short term whotsit loss i am sticking to most recent)
Total with you there Sikel ! - esp. on non-paid (ie amaetuer) MIFA + PIFA .... otherwise doing a 'profesional' job (ie in this case properly) just means you got paid to do it!

following on from 'Workplace' : and this is a big one >>>>

how much money (nationally) is being diverted from actual archaeological investigation and into weekly accomadtion, as it seems that units from end of the country are whizzing to the other, whilst equally capable archaeologists are zooming past in the oppasite direction ?
- perhapes i am wrong...
but how come i see all kinds of far away companies winning tenders over close-by ones? - how can accomadation/travel costs disappear so easily (it seems) ? and yet money for technical work be tight as a badgers @ss ?
and how can this possibly be good for (longterm) lifestyles ?
(just a thought)