History

History of the Natural Sciences Conservation Group (NSCG)

NSCG formed in 1995 from the former Natural Sciences Section of UKIC (United Kingdom Institute of Conservation). UKIC underwent a restructuring in 1995 necessitating a re-think. Remaining within UKIC, becoming a British 'branch' of SPNHC, or merging with BCG and/or GCG were discussed but at that time the most viable option then was to go it alone. In turn, the Natural Sciences Section of UKIC had formed as a result of discussions and actions arising out of the International Symposium and First World Congress on the Preservation and Conservation of Natural History Collections held in Madrid in May 1992 (and known as the Madrid Conference for short!). With soaring cost of UKIC membership and because most NSCG members were hybrid collections managers, curators and conservators, NSCG became independent in 1995.

History of the Biological Curator's Group (BGC)

BCG formed in 1975 to represent all things nationally to do with the curation and management of biological life science collections, to parallel the activities of the Geology Curators Group. The Biology Curators Group was an association of museum professionals, dedicated to care, interpretation and research of Natural History Collections. Members were dedicated to improving standards in all of these areas.

BCG aimed to facilitate the interchange of information between individuals concerned with the management of biological collections and records, their conservation and interpretation and to present the views of curators of biological collections.

Emerging as the Natural Sciences Collections Association (NatSCA)

Further changes to the structure and organisation of UKIC followed, plus ongoing constructive discussion with BCG led to the merger of NSCG and BCG in April 2003.

After much careful negotiation and because there was some duplication of effort, NSCG and BCG both dissolved and merged to form NatSCA Natural Sciences Collections Association (registered with the Charity Commission) at a meeting in the University of Manchester Museum on 7th April 2003 after both memberships were balloted and agreed to merge. This was done in order to better serve our individual and institutional members and to better represent the needs of Natural Sciences Collections to National and Local government, to funding bodies and other professional museum and biology recording organisations. You can find our constitution, here.