2010-2011 VRA Foundation Professional Development Grant Program

A Note about the 2010-2011 VRAF Professional Development Award
The VRA Foundation established the VRAF Professional Development Award in accordance with its broad mission of advancing education and knowledge across the cultural heritage community. For 2009-10, the award supported attendance at the Visual Resources Association annual conference in Atlanta. We were pleased to give the award to a library school student working in a related discipline, film archives. After attending the VRA conference under the auspices of the Foundation award, our grantee became a member of the VRA. With the announcement of that first award, we noted that, in future years there would be opportunities for awardees to attend other educational events or embark on research activities.

With the 2010-2011 award we would like to encourage the VR community to experience opportunities beyond the annual VRA conference. In doing so, we hope to facilitate cross-fertilization for VR professionals in the broader community. In order to meet this goal, the 2010-2011 award will be limited to opportunities other than the 2011 VRA Annual Conference and the 2011 ARLIS/VRAF Summer Educational Institute.

As part of our broad educational mission, and in observance of IRS rules governing our organizational status as a public charity, the VRAF Professional Development award is open to the public, including members of VRA and members of related organizations (for example, MCN, AMIA, SAA, ACRL, and ARLIS.)

The Foundation is committed to supporting educational and research opportunities for the visual resources profession in as many ways possible. We provide support for educational events at the VRA annual conference and the ARLIS/NA-VRAF Summer Educational Institute is made possible, in part, through the support of the VRAF. We look forward to continuing work with the community on these important initiatives.