Process

Preparation

  1. Take the Pledge of Excellence for your institution if you haven’t done it already. This step is a pre-requisite.

  2. Use the free Alliance Reference Guides, sample documents, recorded webinars, publications, and activities to carefully assess existing versions of your Core Documents against the required elements. Revise and approve as needed, or develop your documents from scratch to meet the required elements.

Application

  1. Have your approved documents ready to upload and your credit card information at hand.

  2. Log in. If you and/or your museum does not already have a user account, you will be required to create one first.

  3. Open and complete the Application Form.

    • Step 1: Provide basic contact and profile information about your institution. Any information previously provided to the Alliance will appear here. Please confirm it is correct or update/fill in as needed.

    • Step 2: Upload your Core Documents, provide their respective approval dates, and answer a question about the development of each. Note: regardless of how many Core Documents you initially submit, the mission statement must be included at the time of application.

    • If your institution owns or manages objects/collections you must answer question 10, regardless of whether or not you are submitting its collections management policy for review at the time of application.

  4. Read and agree to the terms and conditions for participating in this program.

  5. Provide payment information (credit card only) and submit the application form. You will be provided with an Order Confirmation form that serves as your receipt.

Technical notes:

  • This application must be completed in one sitting. You are not able save your work and return to it later and there is a timeout period of 20 minutes.
  • If you change your mind or find you are not ready to submit the application, you can cancel and exit the application process at any time. However, you cannot save your work.
  • When in the application form you can return to the previous step or jump ahead to the next one using the buttons on the bottom of each page. 
  • Do not use your browser’s back/forwards buttons or refresh feature, or you will lose data already entered.
  • You may upload more than one file per Core Document if applicable. Acceptable document formats include Word (.doc/docx), Excel (.xls/xlsx.) PowerPoint (.ppt/pptx), Rich Text Format (.rtf), and PDF (.pdf).
  • We suggest converting PowerPoints into PDFs to reduce the file size.
  • If you get a security notice that only secure content is being displayed, do NOT click "show all content". If you do, you will be forced to refresh your browser and lose data already entered. Either just ignore the notice or click the X to close the security warning dialogue window or notice bar.
  • Notify Alliance staff if you make any changes to your application or documents after submission by emailing: core@aam-us.org.

Alliance Review

The Alliance staff will review your institution’s application and documents once payment has been received and processed. Staff will contact you if information or documents need to be replaced, added or changed based on the results of the review. 

To upload revised or additional documents after your initial submission:

  1. Login with the same login information used to create the initial application
  2. Return to the museum’s Core Documents Verification application
  3. Click through to the second page of the application and upload new or revised documents. Be sure to answer any questions about revision or approval dates for the new documents.
  4. Click through and agree to the terms and conditions for participating in this program
  5. You should be brought to a submission confirmation page. Alliance staff will email you to confirm receipt of the new or updated documents within two business days.
    • If you do not receive an email confirming receipt of your new or updated documents within two business days, contact Alliance staff at: core@aam-us.org
    • If you are brought to a payment screen, but have already paid for Core Documents Verification, contact Alliance staff at: core@aam-us.org.

Notify Alliance staff that you have uploaded new or updated documents to your Core Documents Verification submission by emailing core@aam-us.org. Be sure to include the name of your institution in the email and any explanation for document revisions.

Decision

The museum gets a decision on whether the museum’s documents passed. 
All five documents need to pass Core Documents Verification within three years of your initial submission, otherwise you must reapply and resubmit payment to complete the program.

Reaffirmation

The museum informs the Alliance of any changes to its documents and reaffirms its eligibility every five years.  This step is not required for Accredited museums, as the document review is part of reaccreditation.