I’ll be visiting The American Philosophical Society today at 2:30 P.M for my site visit today. I’m excited to be returning to APS and have prepared by printing out the questions to refer back to. I’m meeting with Bayard Miller, Associate Director for Research, Engagement, and Technology. He has an M.A. from Temple University in public history and archives. He’s worked with APS for 10 years now and was the person who helped bring me in as the Levitt Fellow over the summer.
I sent the questions to Bayard a few weeks ago to give him time to prepare for our meeting. Most of the questions I can answer by myself, and will do so in my writing, but I’m mostly interested in knowing more about the funding and staffing. Especially with the collaborative project the Rev City is, where does the money come from? When I worked over the summer with them, it seemed like a small team was working on the project. I wonder if he can share more about plans to add to that staff as 2026 approaches or what the goal is. I’ll be checking in with Sabrina Bocanegra, Assistant Head of Digitization and Digital Access briefly during my visit as well. I’ve already started outlining answers to the 9 questions we were given, and I’m looking forward to writing my report on my site visit. I’ll also be reflecting on my time there and pulling from what I learned on how they operate in my report.