2020 World Monument Watch nominations - ICOMOS reviewers: Call for volunteers

Deadline:
29 March 2019

As you may know, World Monuments Fund (WMF) sponsors the World Monuments Watch (www.wmf.org/watch), a global programme that uses cultural heritage conservation to improve the resilience of communities, enhance social inclusion, and build new capacities in the heritage conservation field and beyond. For the 2020 World Monuments Watch, ICOMOS is again collaborating with WMF by tapping its membership for external desk reviews of the nominations.

As well as identifying reviewers through our ICOMOS International Scientific Committees (ISCs) and National Committees – we are also launching an open call for volunteers among the ICOMOS membership generally. We welcome offers from Emerging Professionals. Wherever possible, Emerging Professionals who are also first-time reviewers or ISCs associate members will be matched to work in collaboration with an expert mentor.

Please take the following elements into account when proposing your offer to volunteer:

• Reviewers must be available to carry out the review(s) in the timespan between 15 April and 29 May 2019 – and submit their review(s) latest by 29 May 2019 (Mentor/Mentee teams will be given one week longer). So as to facilitate work and correspondence, we welcome if one reviewer can take on more than one nomination (in particular for nominations representing the same type of site or originating from the same country). Please indicate in the online questionnaire whether you would be willing to take on multiple reviews (maximum 3).

• We welcome and encourage expert members to offer to support Emerging Professionals (who are also first-time reviewers or ISC associate members) to collaborate on a review through mentoring. The ICOMOS coordination team will match mentors and mentees, or volunteers may identify matches amongst themselves. Mentors will be responsible for managing the collaboration process, quality control and final uploading.

• In addition to the responses received through this call, and depending on the nominations submitted this year, we will also contact specific ICOMOS International Scientific and National Committees for additional suggestions. Once all proposals for reviewers are received, the ICOMOS coordinators and WMF will make a selection and identify any mentoring match-ups between Emerging Professional (who are also first-time reviewers or ISC associate members) and expert members to collaborate as reviewers. Their selection is final. Reviewers will be allocated on the basis of the necessary expertise, the types, locations and numbers of nominations received. This means we may not be able to use all the offers received.

• Reviewers can be from the same country as the nominated site, or from a different country. However, they must confirm that they are not associated with the site or with the nomination in any way (e.g. did not prepare or support the nomination) to avoid any actual or perceived conflict of interest.

• Reviewers will be undertaking the reviews independently, as members identified through the ICOMOS network, and reviews will represent their personal opinion and not (necessarily) that of ICOMOS.

• Reviews are confidential and reviewers must not share information or recommendations (other than between mentor/mentees or with the ICOMOS coordination team).

• Reviews must be written in English, even for nomination dossiers supplied in a different language.

• A modest honorarium of 50 US$ per review will be provided to ICOMOS by WMF. However, as bank-transfer costs to individual reviewers would detract too much from the honorarium amount, members undertaking reviews must agree to donate their honorarium. Unless otherwise indicated by the reviewer – the honorarium will automatically be allocated by ICOMOS Secretariat toward growing the ICOMOS Raymond Lemaire International Fund, which aims to encourage Emerging Professionals to develop their skills. Should the reviewers not wish to allocate their honoraria to the Raymond Lemaire Fund – they can indicate one of the following two alternatives:
  • To donate their honorarium to their associated ISC via the account kept in the ICOMOS International Secretariat bank account, in the name of their associated International Scientific Committee.
  • To donate the honorarium to the ICOMOS Victoria Falls Solidarity Fund, whose purpose is to provide financial support to ICOMOS members from countries facing financial difficulties to attend ICOMOS General Assemblies, so that these are genuinely representative and inclusive of the global membership of the organization.

Selected reviewers will be asked to indicate their choice in the reviewer form they will be asked to forward with their review.

Once the 2020 World Monuments Watch nominations close on 1 March 2019, WMF will provide ICOMOS with the list of nominations it is requested to review, and together we will proceed to matching the sites with reviewers. After this WMF will provide each reviewer with access to reviewer guidelines, their allocated complete nomination dossier (via a secure website) along with a form that considers the following factors on which the nominations will be evaluated:

- the potential to improve the lives of communities
- the cultural significance of the nominated site;
- the need for urgent action, or other circumstances that make action timely;
- the feasibility of the proposed conservation action/approach.

Reviewers will then have three weeks to complete the review and return it directly to WMF. The entire process will be done electronically. In those cases where Emerging professionals are working with a mentor, the arrangements will be slightly different (an extra week given for reviews) with mentors being responsible for managing the collaboration process, quality control and final uploading.

The Reviewer Guidelines are available via this link.

To submit your offer to volunteer as a reviewer before 29 March – please click here to fill in the on-line form.

Offers submitted by other means will not be considered.

This year the ICOMOS Coordination will be undertaken by Sheridan Burke with the assistance of Emerging Professionals, and with the support of the International Secretariat.

If you have any questions on this call please contact Sheridan Burke (burkesheridan[at]gmail.com) with a copy to the International Secretariat (secretariat[at]icomos.org).

 

Photo: Chao Phraya in Bangkok, Thailand  - one of the sites nominated for the 2018 World Monument Watch.
Credit: Flickr Creative commons (Clay Giligand)