Next up in our series of know your professional organizations, we have a sub-category of last week’s featured organization: the AAM’s Emerging Museum Professionals. Now, not all of you are just emerging. Some of you have been out there in the ranks for years. But …
Today’s New York Times reports that a spanking new museum, Go Fish, is reaping criticism. Some residents think that the 14 million dollar institution in Georgia is a boondoogle; an out-of-scale extravagance for a poor state during a recession. Others defend the museum, explaining that …
Remember our post a while back about skills every museo should have?
Well, one of them was grant writing. In that spirit, we’ll be talking about a few ways to educate yourself about writing grants. They may not be the flashiest, quickest way to fundraise, but they are an important piece of the puzzle. Being able to point to your resume and say “yes, I wrote and secured that grant to fund that program/conservation/collection assessment” is a great big plus for anyone seeking a job.
First up is The Foundation Center. This is a HUGE website and resource, and primarily exists to connect grantmakers with grant writers across the nonprofit field, not just museums. At its heart, the Foundation Center is a searchable database of all places you can find funding. It’s really so much more than that, though. The Center also provides research reports on all aspects of fundraising, and extensive training opportunities for those interested in learning more.
There are a few ways to get that training.
1) The Grantseeker Training Institute is the Center’s most comprehensive overview of how to set about finding, writing, and administering grants. It comes highly recommended. It’s a bit pricey, at $795 for a week of training, and is only offered in certain locations.
2) One-Day Training Sessions. These run about $195 per session, and are more tightly focused than the Training Institute. They’re also offered more widely – there are several coming up in Boston this spring.
3) Last, but most certainly not least: free webinars. Lots and LOTS of them, on all sorts of interesting and useful subjects. They’re 60 minutes each, and if you watch even a handful you will be well on your way to understanding all sorts of issues with grants, foundations, fundraising, and nonprofit management.
Welcome to the weekly Museums in the News roundup! Beirut Cathedral Museum reveals layers of Christian history (St. George Orthodox Cathedral, Beirut, Lebanon) Washington State History Museum finds support (Washington State History Museum, Tacoma, Washington) Lady Gaga exhibition in Dutch Museum (Groninger Museum, Groningen, Netherlands) …
The AAM Facebook feed just congratulated Hancock Shaker Village on receiving a $1 million grant from the Kresge Foundation. Read the original article. There are some really, really interesting things going on in there amidst all the business-speak. “[The grant] recognizes the living history museum’s …
[Amanda’s note: This is the first of what we hope to be many posts by other members of the Tufts Museum Studies community. If you are a member of our community, and are interested in contributing your thoughts, please let us know! If you need some ideas to spark your muse, check out our list of ideas for posts.]
Identity Museums Challenge History’s Received Truths from The New York Times, December 29, 2010
I thought this article offered some good food for thought about how museums shape (and/or re-shape) our collective cultural understanding of the world. As egalitarian as we may strive to be, the story we tell with our collections and exhibitions is always one person’s (or group’s) story, and most likely someone will feel left out or misrepresented. But what happens if our desire for inclusion of all begins to tamper with the “truth” that is our past?
Jenn DePrizio teaches Museum Education in the Tufts Museum Studies program, and is Director of Visitor Learning at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.