If your museum has a lawyer they consult, that's a good place to start. Some states legally require background checks in certain situations and will define that. So you should check to see if the State of Connecticut requires checks and what those are. If there are no legal requirements, it is a good idea to have all volunteers who work in areas where there are children to do something. That way if something happens I(and the checks will not prevent anything) you can at least show that you took good steps to screen volunteers.
Pennsylvania recently clarified its requirements and made it easy to do PA State Police Criminal Checks and PA Child Abuse Clearance checks on line (free for volunteers). For volunteers here who come from out of state, they also do FBI fingerprinting. For PA, the checks are good for 5 years and volunteers can keep the results and use them for other institutions where they volunteers. When we first introduced them, there was some kick-back - from volunteers who worked behind-the-scenes who rarely encountered minors. That was more in the style they were introduced than the principle of doing them. These days volunteers are used to this and understand that it protects their museum in the event of a lawsuit. If you make sure volunteers understand why they need to do the checks they are more likely to accept the inconvenience and invasion of privacy.
I believe that it is very rare that museums these days do not requires some kind of checks. Do some research to see what is required and what is effective.
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Lois Kuter
Manager of Volunteer Services
Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University
Philadelphia PA
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