Held in Trust Advisory Council

Brian Vallo, four-year director of the Indian Arts Research Center (IARC) at the School for Advanced Research resigned on Friday January 4, 2019. Starting immediately, Vallo will assume the role of Acoma Pueblo’s governor. Upon his resignation, Vallo shared, “I am humbled by this great honor to serve my community as Governor, the responsibility is tremendous and the opportunities equally great. I have enjoyed working with such an amazing and competent staff to enhance signature programming and expand IARC’s capacity to make an even greater impact to programs and new initiatives. This work has, and will continue to set new standards for collaboration, education, community engagement, and collections stewardship. SAR must take great pride in the positive impact of its initiatives to further advance the field of museology and capacity-building among tribal communities. I have every confidence the IARC and SAR will continue to lead important and impactful initiatives.”

As the director of the IARC at SAR (School for Advanced Research), Vallo led a significant and nationally-recognized initiative on proper stewardship of Native American collections by spearheading the development and 2016 publication of a protocol for how source communities and collecting institutions can work together, known as the Guidelines for Collaboration. Vallo advised museum curators and exhibition-design teams on the implementation of the Guidelines, including recent work with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Field Museum in Chicago. Under his guidance, the IARC collections grew to over 12,000 works of primarily Southwestern Native American art that span the sixth century to the present and SAR’s Native American artist fellowship program continued to thrive. In his new role as the Governor of Acoma Pueblo, Vallo will continue to be influential in the emerging dialogue concerning source communities and collecting institutions

Dr. Jontyle Robinson, trailblazing, innovative art historian/curator received her doctoral degree in art history from the University of Maryland, College Park and was the first curator for both the Spelman College Museum of Fine Art in Atlanta and Tuskegee University’s Legacy Museum /Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site. Her groundbreaking research on Archibald Motley at the Chicago History Center resulted in New York City’s Kenkeleba Gallery “Three Masters: Archibald Motley, Eldzier Cortor, and Hughie Lee Smith.” In 1991, the Chicago History Center, mounted "The Art of Archibald John Motley, Jr" from her decade-long research which was, also, the foundation for the Whitney Museum's exhibition “Archibald Motley: Jazz Age Modernist " on view from October 2015-January 2016. She curated/ co-authored for the Spelman College Museum of Fine Art's contribution to the 1996 Olympics, "Bearing Witness: Contemporary Works by African American Women Artists,” the first exhibition /catalogue of contemporary African American women artists touring America. "Forever Free: Art by African American Women1862-1980" was the first. In 2016, Robinson conceptualized the Alliance of HBCU Museums & Galleries, a coalition of 11 Historically Black College and University Museums and Galleries. She is Founding Director.

There are Alliance students/programs at Yale University, Princeton University (two programs Princeton University Library and the Princeton University Art Museum), University of Delaware/Winterthur Museum; American Art Museum, Smithsonian Institution/Lunder Conservation Center, The Brooklyn Museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art, Crystal Bridges, UCLA/Getty, Georgia O’Keefe Museum, SUNY/Buffalo, American Institute for Conservation, the Bard Research Center in Manhattan, Harvard University Art Museums.

On August 30, 2020 Robinson was featured in a segment regarding students from HBCUs and art conservation on "CBS Sunday Morning."

The International Review of African American Art (Vol 30 No 1) published her article August, 2020 "Diversity in Art Conservation: Diverting the Crisis.”

As Senior Director for Museum Standards and Excellence at the American Alliance of Museums, Ms. Hart provides leadership and oversight of its Continuum of Excellence, a pathway of standards-based programs including AAM’s Accreditation and Museum Assessment Programs, as well as AAM and field-wide standards and ethics initiatives. She has been involved with accreditation and efforts to nurture institutional excellence throughout her 25 year tenure at AAM, providing her with insight into the best practices, issues, and challenges faced by museums and non-profits of many types and sizes.

Ms. Hart is an internationally sought expert to speak and advise on the US model of museum standards and accreditation. She has developed and delivered numerous presentations, trainings, and multi-day workshops on accreditation and museum standards at national, regional, state, and international venues—including Italy, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and China. She also co-created AAM’s two-day professional education seminar Secrets of Accreditation and a two-year collaborative standards assessment project with the Institute of Museum Leadership in Mexico; and served as a consultant for the Alberta Museums Association’s accreditation program.

She participates in the broader field of non-profit standards and accreditation by serving and Peer Reviewer and Council member for the Maryland Nonprofits’ Standards for Excellence Institute. She also regularly does grant reviews for IMLS and spent many years as a member of the U.S. Army Certification Team Report Review Panel.

Prior to joining AAM, she pursued her interest in American art and museum work through curatorial and collections management training at the National Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery. She holds an M.A. in Art History from The George Washington University and a B.A. in Art History and International Affairs from the University of Mary Washington.

I work as Director and CEO of History Nebraska, the state’s historical society. We do pretty much everything you can imagine related to the state’s history. History Nebraska includes a network of historic sites, the state museum, state archives, an entire squad of archeologists, and four amazing conservators with an independent lab. I also serve as the State Historic Preservation Officer and spend a lot of time thinking about the role historic buildings have in building strong communities. I spent years working as a curator and exhibition designer, and I’m passionate about making the cool artifacts museum workers get to touch more accessible to audiences. I’ve written numerous articles about making museum collections useful. I was also the co-editor of Active Collections, winner of the National Council on Public History’s award for the best public history book in 2020. The global pandemic has made it a rough time to be a museum leader, but reading my historical picture book Major: A Soldier Dog to kids has been a welcome reminder of why our work matters.

Dr. Sarah Jones Weicksel, a historian and material culture scholar, is the Director of Research and Publications at the American Historical Association, where she oversees the AHA’s research initiatives and publications program. She is also a Research Associate at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, where she recently co-curated with Amanda Moniz, Who Pays for Education? Her research and museum work focuses on United States history, material culture, race, gender, and the politics of everyday life. The author of several peer-reviewed articles, she is currently at work on a book about the American Civil War era. The project focuses on how people used clothing both to wage a cultural and political war against one another and as a tool for living through this conflict. Dr. Weicksel earned a PhD in History from the University of Chicago, an MA in American Material Culture from the Winterthur Program at the University of Delaware, and a BA in History from Yale University.

As the Public Art & Civic Design Senior Program Manager, Patricia Walsh overseas five program areas under the Equity + Local Arts Engagement department including Arts and Community Development; Arts in Civic Design; Creative Placemaking; Cultural Districts, Trails and Tourism; and Public Art. Through her work she engages with and works to educate local arts agency leaders on how to utilize the arts to equitably address community needs and goals. Her work aims to support professional development, resource building and networking opportunities for arts administrators to utilize the arts to create accessible public spaces, enable inclusive and equitable community development, and ensure the arts are an active component in equitable economic growth and sustainability.

Patricia is a member of the Arts and Planning Interest Group Steering Committee for American Planning Association, co-chair for the Washington District Council on Placemaking for Urban Land Institute, an artist selection committee member for two projects with the City of Rockville, Maryland, and a jury member for the Jorge and Darlene Pérez Prize in Public Art & Civic Design.

She holds a Master of Science in Arts Administration from Boston University, a Bachelor of Arts in painting from State University of New York at Plattsburgh, and an Associates in Applied Science in Commercial Art from Dutchess Community College.

Michelle Magalong is a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow at the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at University of Maryland. She brings to this role her extensive professional and research experience in community development, historic preservation and public health in underserved communities.

Magalong’s work has been dedicated to telling the stories of historically marginalized groups through public humanities and historic preservation. Her doctorate in Urban Planning at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) focused on the process and development of the National Park Service Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Initiative and Theme Study, part of the Park Service’s recent effort to identify, acknowledge and preserve more inclusive and diverse historic sites.

During Magalong’s two-year appointment at UMD, she will expand upon her dissertation work to explore the importance and impact of the National Park Service Heritage Initiatives that include the American Latino Theme Study, LGBTQ Theme Study and special resources studies on women, the Civil Rights movement and African American Heritage Initiative. Her research—Telling All American Stories: A Movement of Diversity, Inclusion, and Relevancy in Historic Preservation—has the ultimate goals of increasing the number of nominations and listings on the National Register of Historic Places and as National Historic Landmarks and raising the degree of scholarship on these kinds of historic preservation efforts. Currently, less than 10 percent of national landmarks are associated with African Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders, women and LGBTQ individuals.

She received her BA in Ethnic Studies and Urban Studies and Planning at University of California, San Diego (UCSD), and MA in Urban Planning at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Dr. Magalong serves as President of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans in Historic Preservation (APIAHiP), a national volunteer-run, nonprofit organization. Her research and professional experience focus on community engagement, historic preservation, and social justice. She has served in advisory roles in historic preservation and community development, notably for the National Park Service, California State Office of Historic Preservation, and City of Los Angeles Office of Historic Resources. She was also recognized in 2018 as one of the “40 Under 40: People Saving Places” by National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Kristina L. Durocher is the director and curator of the Museum of Art of the University of New Hampshire where she creates opportunities to teach and interact with art as a primary source for academic and social engagement. During her twenty-plus years working in the museum field she has curated interdisciplinary and collaborative exhibitions that are innovative and impactful; demonstrating commitment to the diversity and sustainability of visual arts and culture. Her educational programming creates pathways for identity-building, civic engagement, and empowers self-directed learning for people of all ages.

Ms. Durocher advocates for institutional and field-wide excellence, reinvention, and individual professional growth in her positions as president of the Association of Academic Museum and Galleries and vice-president on the board of directors of the New England Museum Association. In 2019, she co-edited, For Love or Money: Confronting the State of Museum Salaries, contributing an essay on legislation to end salary inequality. Recognized as a leader in the museum field, she was named a fellow of the Getty Leadership Institute in 2017. She holds a M.A. in Art History from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst with a concentration in contemporary art. She received a dual B.F.A. in Art History and Painting from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston.

Brent R. Benjamin came to the Saint Louis Art Museum in 1999 from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where he had served for 12 years in curatorial and administrative roles, culminating in five years as deputy director for curatorial affairs. As the Barbara B. Taylor Director of the Saint Louis Art Museum, he led the initiative to expand the Museum and raise $160 million in the largest capital campaign for a cultural institution in St. Louis.

He has overseen the purchase of numerous works of art for the Museum, including Bartolomeo Manfredi’s “Apollo and Marsyas;” Henry Ossawa Tanner’s “Gateway, Tangier;” and Edgar Degas’s “The Milliners;” and Andy Goldsworthy’s site-specific sculpture, Stone Sea. He also has secured major gifts such as George Caleb Bingham’s Election Series, Jackson Pollock’s “Number 3, 1950” and notable collections of Chinese bronzes and post-war German paintings and drawings. Most recently, he initiated a series of donations that included Carolyn Danforth’s late husband’s extraordinary collection of more than 300 objects made by American Indian tribes from the Northern and Southern Plains; a gift of more than 1,300 Japanese woodblock prints and related materials from Charles and Rosalyn Lowenhaupt; nearly 150 European paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints from the collection of Mark Weil and Phoebe Dent Weil; and the transformative bequest by C.C. Johnson Spink and Edith “Edie” Spink of 225 works of art, including important American paintings and more than 200 works of Asian art.

Brent Benjamin received his undergraduate degree from St. Olaf College and holds a graduate degree in the History of Art from Williams College, where he was named the Robert Sterling Clark Fellow.  He attended the Qualifying Graduate Program in Architecture at Rice University and the Harvard University program for Art Museum Directors.

Ellen Pearlstein was the Senior Objects Conservator at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, where she also served as an advisor on NAGPRA. She was adjunct faculty and later chair of a curriculum review committee at the Institute of Fine Arts-Conservation Center at NYU. Ellen has designed and taught courses in Egypt and the Netherlands, supervised conservation interns from Egypt, Germany, France and the UK, and has lectured at graduate programs at the University of Delaware-Winterthur and Buffalo State College. In 2005, Ellen assumed a faculty position in the UCLA/Getty Program in the Conservation of Archaeological and Ethnographic Material.  As a member of the founding faculty, Ellen and her colleagues designed curriculum, outfitted a laboratory, and Ellen began teaching graduate classes in the conservation of organic materials, ethics of working with indigenous communities, preventive conservation and managing collections.  In 2008, Ellen joined UCLA’s Department of Information Studies, and invited students interested in library and archive materials into her preservation and management classes.  Ellen’s research includes conservation of featherwork and basketry, effects of environmental agents; pre- and post-Hispanic qeros from the Andes; and curriculum development within conservation education.  Ellen is a Fellow in the American Institute for Conservation and the International Institute for Conservation, winner of the Keck award, and President of the Association of North American Gradate Programs in Conservation.

Gina Crevello is an architectural conservator and a professional associate (PA) of the American Institute of Conservation. She is principal of Echem Consultants LLC, a recognized forensic, corrosion and material science consultancy which she founded in 2009. With 23 years’ experience, Gina has been working specifically in material diagnostics and durability engineering for more than a decade. Gina specializes in condition assessments, corrosion diagnostics, material testing, forensic investigations and electrochemical design and repair solutions for historic and existing structures. 

Gina’s work includes diagnostics, analysis and repair of existing structures and advice on material selection, design and construction monitoring for new construction. With our unique holistic approach to understanding material conditions, we can assist owners in making better, more durable choices for their structures. Our service life assessment approach, Life 52®, includes four components to our work: Lab Services, Investigation Services, Engineering and Design Support, and Field Support.

Gina has been professionally trained at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, having graduated with a Master of Science in Architectural Materials Conservation, and an Advanced Certificate in Conservation of Historic Buildings and Sites. 

Gina is currently the President of the Board of Directors for the Association for Preservation Technology International (APT), whose mission is to advance appropriate traditional and new technologies to care for, protect, and promote the longevity of the built environment and to cultivate the exchange of knowledge throughout the international community.  She is also active with the National Association of Corrosion Engineers (NACE) having co-authored inspection and assessment documents for historic steel frame construction and chaired the Concrete Service Life Conference for four consecutive years.  She has authored extensively corrosion diagnostics and electrochemical repair for historic steel frame masonry clad structures and historic concrete.  Her firm is a leader in the field for the use of Impressed Current Cathodic Protection in historic masonry clad steel frame construction.

Specialties include: Non-Destructive Evaluations, Forensic Investigations, Corrosion Condition Evaluations, Durability Analyses, Understanding and Predicting Material Degradation and Corrosion Related Failures, Material Selection for Repairs or New Construction, Conservation Guidelines and Specifications, Designing and Specifying Corrosion Mitigation Options for Unique Structures, Trial and Test Program Development, Project Management, Impressed Current Cathodic Protection, Galvanic Cathodic Protection, Client Representation and Construction Administration, Grounding/ Bonding, AC Stray Current Mitigation.

Mr. Turner has been Executive Director of the Midwest Art Conservation Center (MACC) since 2002 after prior nonprofit experience as the Director of United Arts in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the Director of Fundraising for Fresh Air Radio in Minneapolis. Mr. Turner has a special interest in archaeology and indigenous and world cultural objects and holds degrees in Anthropology and History from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, as well as advanced training in Nonprofit Business Administration from the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis. His business experience includes 11 years as the owner of a manufacturer’s representative firm and 4 years founding and managing a publishing company. Mr. Turner is a Professional Associate of The American Institute for Conservation, a member of the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits and the Twin Cities Nonprofit Financial Group, Chair of the National Association of Regional Conservation Centers, a member of the Regional Alliance for Preservation and serves on the Heritage Emergency National Task Force.

Bill Veillette has been executive director of NEDCC since late 2009. Previously, he was executive director of the New Hampshire Historical Society where he focused on improving the preservation of and access to its collections and strengthening local historical societies. He is responsible for leading and managing the overall operation of NEDCC. Bill has a particular interest in helping collections-holding institutions develop financial strategies to sustain their online digital content and make the case for their fundamental mission of saving, preserving, and sharing historic and artistic works. He currently serves as a trustee of Historic Deerfield, an overseer of Historic New England, and a fellow of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Bill earned a B.A. in Economics from Cornell University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and has co-authored three books: An Early History of New Concord, N.Y. (1990), Amherst Historical Moments (2004), and Walking Tours of Amherst Village (2010).

Toni Kiser is the Senior Registrar at The National WWII Museum. She oversees all aspects of registration and collection management and has worked on varied projects from large exhibit installations, digitization projects, storage moves, artifact re-housing, and cataloging and nomenclature standards. She is the author of Loyal Forces: American Animals in WWII and co-editor of Museum Registration Methods, 6th edition. Ms. Kiser serves on the Board for the Association of Registrars and Collection Specialists, currently serving as President. She holds a BA in History from Brevard College and an MA in Museum Studies from The George Washington University.

N. Elizabeth Schlatter is Deputy Director and Curator of Exhibitions at the University of Richmond Museums, Virginia. A museum administrator, curator, and writer, she focuses on modern and contemporary art and on topics related to curating and issues specific to university museums. At UR, she has curated more than 20 exhibitions, including recent group exhibitions of contemporary art such as “Action & Reaction: Looking at the Art of Social Justice,” “Crooked Data: (Mis)Information in Contemporary Art,” “Anti-Grand: Contemporary Perspectives on Landscape,” and “Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists,” She also serves on and chairs various committees at the University and School of Arts & Sciences.

She is currently President of the College Art Association (2022). Prior to this elected position, Schlatter completed a 4-year term as a CAA board member, elected in February 2016. During that time, she served as VP for Annual Conference for two years, and in 2019 she served on the Nominating Committee and the Strategic Planning Task Force. She jointly initiated and assisted with the development of CAA's Resources for Academic Art Museums Professionals (RAAMP), and prior to joining CAA’s board, she was chair of the Museum Committee.

Prior to the University of Richmond, she worked with exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES) in Washington, D.C, and in fundraising at the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston. She is author of Museum Careers: A Practical Guide for Novices and Students (Left Coast Press, Inc.) and a contributor to A Life in Museums: Managing Your Museum Career (American Association of Museums). She has a B.A. in art history from Southwestern University in Texas, and an M.A. in art history from George Washington University.

Jeanne Marie Teutonico is currently Associate Director, Strategic Initiatives and Publications, at the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI) in Los Angeles where her responsibilities include the development of strategic priorities for the Institute’s programmatic work and oversight of GCI publications. An architectural conservator with over thirty years of experience in the conservation of buildings and sites, she received an AB (Hons) in art history from Princeton University and an MSc in historic preservation from Columbia University, Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

Prior to joining the GCI in 1999, Jeanne Marie was a conservator and educator on the staff of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) in Rome, and later of English Heritage in London where she led a large technical research and publications program.

Jeanne Marie is published widely and maintains research interests in the conservation and sustainable use of traditional building materials.  She was an invited Resident at the American Academy in Rome in 2008 and is a Fellow of the Association for Preservation Technology, the Society of Antiquaries, and the International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (IIC). 

Jennifer Jae Gutierrez is Executive Director of the Image Permanence Institute (IPI) at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT). IPI is an academic research laboratory, within the College of Art and Design, focused on research that informs the preservation of cultural heritage collections. Areas of expertise include the preservation of photographic materials and sustainable practices in preservation environmental management.

Prior to her appointment at RIT, Jae was the Arthur J. Bell Senior Photograph Conservator at the Center for Creative Photography (CCP), University of Arizona, Tucson where she established the institution’s conservation department. Before that, she held a faculty appointment in the Art Conservation Department at the University of Delaware (UD) where she taught undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in preventive conservation, conservation ethics, and the conservation of photographic materials. She also served as Associate Director of the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation from 2010-2012.

Jae is a professional associate of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC) and has a Master of Science in Art Conservation from the University of Delaware specializing in photograph conservation. Recently published essays include The Preservation of Platinum and Palladium Prints: Storage and Display (American Institute for Conservation, 2017), Preventing Destruction: Preserving Our Irreplaceable Photographic Heritage (Smithsonian, 2017), and Pinups, Photograms, Polaroids and Printing Plates: Iterations in Robert Heinecken’s Work Process (Museum of Modern Art, 2014). With Debra Hess Norris, she edited Issues in the Conservation of Photographs published by the Getty Conservation Institute in 2010.

With two decades experience in the museum field, Elysia’s career has demonstrated a commitment to collaborative programming and a dedication to community-based collections care. Under her leadership, the IARC continues to be at the forefront of the national conversation around how collecting institutions and Native American communities can work together to foster and promote cultural heritage and further contemporary art practices. Formerly the IARC’s curator of education, Elysia furthered a Native artist fellowship program and developed an internship program that is now one of the most nationally recognized. She also developed and led IARC education outreach initiatives and programming. Elysia received her BA in art history and criticism from the University of California, San Diego and MA in art history from the University of New Mexico. Prior to coming to SAR, Elysia worked for the Autry National Center in Los Angeles, Museum of Indian Arts & Culture in Santa Fe, and Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque.

Sarah Zenaida Gould, Ph.D. is Interim Executive Director of the Mexican American Civil Rights Institute, a national project to collect and disseminate Mexican American civil rights history. A longtime public historian, she has curated over a dozen exhibits on history, art, and culture, and was formerly founding director of the Museo del Westside and lead curatorial researcher at the Institute of Texan Cultures. Gould is co-founder and co-chair of Latinos in Heritage Conservation, a national organization that promotes historic preservation within American Latino communities and advocates for the protection of Latino tangible and intangible heritage. Additionally, she serves on the board of the Friends of the Texas Historical Commission, on the council of the American Association of State and Local History, and is an active member of the Westside Preservation Alliance, a coalition dedicated to promoting and preserving the working-class architecture of San Antonio's Westside. She received a BA in American Studies from Smith College and an MA and PhD in American Culture from the University of Michigan. She is a former fellow at the National Museum of American History, the Winterthur Museum, and the American Antiquarian Society, and is an alumna of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture Leadership Institute.

Tom Clareson is Senior Consultant for Digital & Preservation Services at LYRASIS, consulting internationally on preservation, disaster preparedness, digitization, funding, strategic planning, and advocacy for arts and cultural organizations.  He also serves as Project Director of Performing Arts Readiness, funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to help performing arts organizations protect their assets, sustain operations, and prepare for emergencies.  Clareson is Vice President of the Board of Directors for the Foundation for Advancement in Conservation, Board of Directors Secretary of LancasterChorale (Ohio), and a member of the National Board of Advisors of the Richard M. Ross Art Museum at Ohio Wesleyan University.  He has experience teaching graduate-level courses for the University of Texas at Austin, University of California-Los Angeles, and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Stephen Kidd is the executive director of the National Humanities Alliance. Before joining NHA, he was director of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, the Smithsonian Institution's "Museum without Walls." As director, he oversaw the development of major, research-based exhibitions including, among others, Crisis and Creativity: Unfolding the AIDS Memorial Quilt (2012), Colombia: the Nature of Culture (2011), and Asian Pacific Americans: Local Lives, Global Ties (2010). Prior to his work at the Smithsonian, he served on the staff of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. He holds a B.A. in history from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in American Studies from the George Washington University.

As the Vice President for the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Preservation Services & Outreach Department, Rob Nieweg is a leader of the Trust’s efforts to strengthen and diversify the historic preservation movement.

Rob has worked as a preservation advocate since 1989, when he directed Landmark West, a New York City group. In 1994 Rob joined the National Trust and, working as a Field Director and Field Officer, he has helped save historic places in collaboration with community members in the District of Columbia, Virginia, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, South Dakota, Utah, Florida, and West Virginia.

Today, as Vice President, Rob leads a group of experienced preservation professionals working from New York City, Chicago, Atlanta, Washington DC, Houston, Denver, and Los Angeles. The Preservation Services & Outreach Department provides grant funding, technical assistance, training, and educational materials. Each year we convene the preservation movement at PastForward, the national conference. The department also leads effective coalitions to save historic places, specializing in solutions-oriented advocacy in collaboration with public- and private-sector partners.

As an attorney, Rob enables public participation in preservation-based land-use planning, federal Section 106 consultation, and other administrative review processes. Rob holds degrees from Vassar College, Columbia University, and the University at Buffalo Law School.

Carrie Villar is the John and Neville Bryan Senior Director of Museum Collections at the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In this role, she manages the National Trust’s museum collections, which includes historic buildings, landscapes and 60,000 objects. At the Trust she has also served as the Acting Vice President for Historic Sites, as well as the Interim Executive Director of the Woodrow Wilson House.

Prior to that, Carrie served as Senior Curator at The History Factory in Washington, DC, where she served as the creative lead on teams that worked with a diverse range of corporate and nonprofit clients including the Los Angeles Unified School District, Whirlpool Corporation, Weight Watchers International, Edward Jones, Boston Scientific and many others. Deliverables for these clients ranged from oral history programs to corporate museums and exhibits to history-based social media platforms.

Previously, Carrie served as the Collections and Research Director at the Baltimore Museum of Industry. Carrie has also worked at the Chemical Heritage Foundation, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, and the Historical Society of Delaware.

Carrie holds her M.A. in History with a Museum Studies Certificate from the University of Delaware, where she received a Hagley Fellowship in the History of Technology and Industrialization. She also earned a Nonprofit Management Executive Certificate from Georgetown University in 2016 and attended the American Express Leadership Academy in 2018.

Justin Wilder is the Manager of Communications and Support Services at National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (National VOAD). National VOAD, an association of organizations that mitigate and alleviate the impact of disasters, provides a forum promoting cooperation, communication, coordination and collaboration; and fosters more effective delivery of services to communities affected by disaster.

During his five years at National VOAD, Justin has been responsible for the creation of a communications plan for National VOAD, the formation of donations and volunteer management systems following Hurricane Harvey, and the development of websites for 55+ affiliate members. Justin has also managed National VOAD’s Committees who are responsible for the creation of policy pertaining to everything from disaster health to volunteer management.

Prior to his time at National VOAD, Justin spent time in the Turks and Caicos running a cholera prevention survey for DFID. This project involved coordinating with local government officials and Haitian refugee groups to ensure that the health care system was prepared for a potential outbreak of cholera. In addition, he has spent considerable time volunteering for political campaigns in Virginia and Maryland.

Justin graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in History from American University in Washington D.C. Justin is currently pursuing a Global Health Policy degree at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. In his free time, he enjoys taking hikes with his daughter Farah, and wife Mariah, visiting National Parks, and occasionally finding a new brewery to visit.

Susan Dolan is the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Bureau Historical Landscape Architect.  She is the national manager of the NPS Park Cultural Landscapes Program.  Her responsibilities include developing, implementing, and overseeing a service-wide landscape preservation program that includes research, planning, stewardship, education, and technology development.  She previously served as the Historical Landscape Architect for Mount Rainier National Park.  Her awards include the 2020 University of Oregon Lawrence Medal for leadership in cultural landscape preservation, and the NPS Director’s 2009 Appleman Judd Lewis Award for Excellence in Cultural Resources Management.  She has undergraduate and graduate degrees in landscape architecture from the University of Oregon and an undergraduate degree in horticulture from Reading University in England.  Her publications include:  "Orchard Stabilization Handbook", USDI NPS and California Department of Parks and Recreation, 2012; “Orchard Management Plan for Manzanar National Historic Site,”  USDI NPS, Pacific West Regional Office, 2011; “Fruitful Legacy: A Historic Context of Orchards and Fruit Trees in the National Park System, from 1600 to the Present,” USDI, NPS, Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation and Pacific West Regional Office, 2009; “Orchard Management Plan for John Muir National Historic Site,”  USDI, NPS, Pacific West Regional Office, 2006.

Ann Hitchcock is Senior Advisor for Scientific Collections and Environmental Safeguards, National Park Service. She oversees servicewide initiatives addressing new issues and requirements for scientific collections and leads the NPS benefits sharing and technology transfer programs (see https://www.nps.gov/nature/benefits-sharing.htm). She also facilitates NPS response and recovery for cultural resources under the National Response Framework (Natural and Cultural Resources and Historic Properties part of Emergency Support Function #11) and National Disaster Recovery Framework (Natural and Cultural Resources Recovery Support Function). She was NPS Chief Curator 1980-2007.

Prior to joining NPS she served as Assistant Chief Curator, Manitoba Museum, Winnipeg, Canada (1977-1980) and Registrar of Anthropological Collections, Museum of Northern Arizona, Flagstaff (1970-1976). 

Anne Amati is the NAGPRA Coordinator and Registrar at the University of Denver Museum of Anthropology (DUMA) in Denver, CO. DUMA is dedicated to increasing knowledge and understanding of world cultures and human diversity while emphasizing the ethical stewardship of collections, research, teaching, educational programming and responsible community engagement. DUMA acknowledges that colonial legacies are embedded in anthropological collections and it strives to address historical wrongs by building collaborative, reciprocal relationships and respecting the rights and cultural protocol of communities represented in the collection. Ms. Amati is responsible for compliance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) as well as ensuring that the University is cultivating and maintaining good relationships with tribes.

Ms. Amati is the PI for a three-year initiative to develop a network for individuals engaged in implementing NAGPRA funded by an Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) National Leadership Grant for Museums. The NAGPRA Community of Practice aims to create a network of NAGPRA practitioners across the U.S. to: increase capacity for implementation in museums; improve overall engagement of the museum field with ongoing NAGPRA work; and decrease misunderstanding and confusion still associated with NAGPRA among some museum professionals. While the project began with a focus on implementation in museums, the scope of the NAGPRA Community of Practice has since broadened to be for all NAGPRA practitioners. This is because we believe implementation in museums will only improve if NAGPRA practitioners from museums, tribes, federal and state agencies, and other disciplines, can come together on a regular basis to learn from each other. As a result, NAGPRA implementation should improve not only in museums, but across the NAGPRA community.

Curt DiCamillo is an American architectural historian and a recognized authority on the British country house. He has written, lectured, and taught in the U.S. and abroad on British history and architecture and leads scholarly tours that focus on the architectural and artistic heritage of Britain and its influence around the world. Since 1999 Curt has maintained an award-winning database on the web, The DiCamillo Database of British & Irish Country Houses, which seeks to document every English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish country house ever built, standing or demolished, together with a history of the families who lived in the houses, the architects who designed them, and the history of the houses’ collections and gardens.

Ms. Shadford is the Executive Director of Voices in Contemporary Art, a leading nonprofit organization that advances artist-centered practices in the research, presentation, and preservation of contemporary art. In this role, Ms. Shadford partners with a diverse range of museums, academic institutions, non-profit organizations, artist-endowed foundations, philanthropic partners, and independent contemporary arts colleagues. Before VoCA, Ms. Shadford managed Sotheby’s Museum Services, engaging institutions across the United States on projects ranging from deaccessioning, appraisals, and exhibition sponsorships. Lauren holds an M.A. in Visual Arts Administration with a focus on Non-for-Profit management from the Steinhardt School at New York University and a B.A. in Art History from Connecticut College.

Larry Sloan stepped into the role of CEO at the American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA) in October 2016.  Prior to this, he served as CEO for seven years at SOCMA, a trade association representing the interests of the US specialty chemical industry.  Larry started his non-profit career at the Adhesive and Sealant Council, a trade association representing adhesive and sealant manufacturers, and was promoted to his first CEO role there in January 2005. He led this group for five years.

Larry began his career as a chemical engineer at Air Products and later worked for Nalco Chemical Company in marketing, manufacturing, and sales capacities.

Larry earned a BS degree in chemical engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, and later graduated from Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management where he earned his MBA.

In 2006, Larry received his Certified Association Executive (CAE) designation through the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE).  Currently he serves in a leadership role on the ASAE Foundation’s Research Committee.  He has served as a speaker and thought leader at various non-profit community events over the years, including ASAE and CESSE (Council of Engineering and Scientific Society Executives).

Prior volunteer leadership roles  include serving as board member and chair (in 2012) of the National Association of Manufacturers’ Council of Manufacturing Associations; a board member of the Société de Chemie Industrielle; an executive committee member of the Science History Institute’s Joseph Priestly Society; and a board member of the Chemical Educational Foundation.