Ben Roberts to Chair a Cultural Heritage by AIA-Military Panel Roundtable
By Ben Roberts
Archaeological Institute of America
At the 2013 meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA), Ben Roberts, a Captain in the Georgia National Guard and a veteran of the Iraq War, as well as a brockingtoncrm.com historian and GIS specialist, will be chairing a roundtable discussion at the Cultural Heritage by AIA-Military Panel (CHAMP) Workshop. The purpose of CHAMP is to support the military through close partnerships with many military and academic constituencies to provide cultural heritage education and training, good policy guidelines, good cultural resource tools, and scholarly advice about sites and artifacts. This workshop will address these issues and determine the best practices for aiding the military in preserving cultural heritage.
Mr. Roberts will be leading a roundtable discussion on developing contingency plans for immediate implementation, within 60-90 days, whenever crises occur. The goal of the roundtables is to work towards resolving all the remaining action items from the previous year's workshop, as well as developing new action items for the coming year.
Given his level of expertise and experience in both the military and CRM, Mr. Roberts is sure to lead an interesting and successful discussion of the extremely important topic of cultural resource emergencies in a military setting. The 2013 AIA conference is scheduled for January 3-6 in Seattle, Washington.