Evaluation Excitements

Hey everybody!  Those of us in the Intro to Audience Research class got to have a Skype interview with a few experienced (and enthusiastic) evaluators yesterday, including Kathryn Owen of the Woodland Park Zoo, Kathleen Tinworth of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, and Steve Yalowitz of the Institute for Learning Innovation (ILI)

During the talk, Kathleen mentioned a blog she writes about her many evaluation adventures.  I asked her if she would mind if I went ahead and linked it to our own blog, and she graciously (and again, quite enthusiastically) agreed.  So, here it is:

http://exposeyourmuseum.com/

I highly recommend checking it out.  She writes a lot about new technologies and reaching out to underrepresented audiences, and it's all quite interesting stuff! 

While My Guitar Gently Rotates in an iPad App

Are iPad apps the future of museums? George Harrison's son Dhani Harrison is putting together a project that digitally showcases his father's guitar collection including 360 degree views, details about the guitar, facts about the guitar's relationship to George, songs he played on each guitar, and more. Harrison said on Conan that he would like to expand the project to collections of other famous guitarists, like Eric Clapton. Seems like a pretty cool way to make private collections like these accessible to the public... Is this the direction of museums and collections of the future?

The app launches this week, and while the $9.99 price tag will probably prevent me from downloading it, I am sorely tempted. Click below to read the NY Times overview of the project:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/23/arts/music/new-ipad-app-the-guitar-collection-george-harrison.html

Museocomics #1: In which the controversy assignment returns

FYI, Megan J. is the funny one in this collaboration. I just doodle and mess with her ideas.

Also, I'm glad this comic is about 580 and not 590, because the 590 version would just be an Excel spreadsheet. And then where would the dinosaur go? 

Museum Advocacy Day Letter Workshop!

So, a few of you may know that my heart yearns for greater museum advocacy.  Weird, you say?  No, I say!  So should yours!  We all know that museums can save the world.  So why are they so chronically underfunded?  As future and emerging museum professionals and potential co-conspirators in the saving of the world, we know that we will need sustenance since we can't eat love (of museums).  Museum Advocacy Day (yes, there is such a thing!) is on Tuesday, February 28th.  AAM has provided some great content and our very own Seattle branch of Emerging Museum Professionals is providing an opportunity for us to get together and make some noise about the good museums do and why in this time of legislative belt-tightening and election campaigning, our legislators should make sure museums get funded.  Please join us and help make some Noise...quietly, with letters.  

We'll be providing the essentials, pizza and accoutrements like writing materials; you bring yourself and those who love museums (and maybe a laptop if you've got one).  A big shout out to the Museology Department for financial support (pizza and print costs)!  Also, we a little short on stamps, so if you can spare some, it is most appreciated.  Do you care enough about your future career to stand up for it?  This event is open, so please also help pass on this invitation to other museum folks and supporters.

MUSEUM ADVOCACY 101

Monday, February 27

6-8 p.m.

UW Campus, Art Building Room 317 (look for signage) 

Thanks,

Lissa

Best Part Of a Museum Is...

According to Visitors, THIS is the Best Part About Going to a Museum
(Hint: It’s Not The Exhibits) 

Interesting article by Colleen Dilenschneide. Obviously pertinent for museologists and suggests that museums may want to reconsider how they design their visitor experience. - Ari

With the budget looming over the heads of the firsties like a tiny apocalypse, I've found it helpful to think back on exactly why I'm here.  That's why I'd like to share the abridged Jablonski museo-origin story, and I encourage all of you to do the same!  Even though nostalgia will not balance a fake museum budget, it is definitely therapeutic!

In the beginning...
Like many six-year-olds, I was dino-crazy.  I could barely remember my own phone number, but I could tell you about the hunting patterns of the deinonychus and the thick bony skull of the pachycephalosaurus.  Basically, I was way cool. 

Evidence of coolness.

Dinosaurs were the subjects of many earliest drawings, stories, and bizarre impressions.   And that's when I saw this:

Awwww yeeeeeeah.

Fake thunder and lightning effects highlight this massive diorama of prehistoric carnage at the Milwaukee Public Museum.  NEAT, right!?  Six-year-old Megan thought so too.  Thus began the early stages of museolove.  At that point, even the dead blank stares of the Streets of Old Milwaukee mannequins couldn't turn me off to museums. 

Fast forward 18 years.  The year was 2009.  A certificate program had drawn me to Illinois, where everybody gets excited about tractors and bears. 

"Sexiest tractor this here side o' the Mississippi!"

Although my certificate was for zoos and aquaria, an internship at the Putnam Museum drew me into the world of museums. On the very first day of my internship, my mentor had a brief conversation with a squirrel skeleton on her desk.  And that's when I knew I was in the right place. 

Ghost dance party!  These probably happen in museums. 

One of my first solo projects at the museum involved cataloging the massive paleo-invertebrate collection at the Putnam.  Essentially, I was locked in a storeroom surrounded by dead things for 8 hours a day for 2 months.  Despite my somewhat antsy nature, it remains one of my favorite projects simply because of how amazing it felt to be around things that had actually been alive over 400 million years ago.  That is SO MANY YEARS YOU GUYS! 

400 million years is like almost infinity years! 

We may not be fighting off Nazis and rescuing religious relics like Indiana Jones, but if we're lucky we may just get to hold a trilobite in our hands, catalogue a neat basket, or get a future Museologist just as excited about old things as we all are.  And those hopeful thoughts will get me through the budget.  Power on, Museologists.   

The Mob Museum - No, this isn't part of Wilson's Assignment

How sweet, The Mob Museum opened on Valentine's Day in Las Vegas, Nevada.  Would Bugsy be proud?

Here are some quick facts:

• Cost $42 million for construction 
• Funded by the city of Las Vegas and nearly $9 million in federal, state and local historic preservation grants. It is run by the 501 (c) 3 non-profit 300 Stewart Avenue Corporation.
• Exhibit Space 17,000 sq.ft (Total space: 41, 000 sq.ft)
• Location: A historic building, once a federal courthouse and Post Office, and the site of hearings into organized crimes in 1950. 

Mission (?) I didn't find anything titled mission, but this was written under "Overview." Maybe the mob doesn't want to reveal to much about the business?

"The Mob Museum, a 501 (c) 3 non-profit, is an interactive Museum dedicated to the history of organized crime and law enforcement. The Museum presents a bold and authentic view of organized crime’s impact on Las Vegas history, as well as, its unique imprint on America and the world. The Museum presents the real stories and actual events of mob history via interactive and engaging exhibits that reveal all sides of the story about the role of organized crime in the U.S. The Mob Museum offers multiple perspectives and provides a contemporary, engaging, challenging and educational experience."

If you want some info, read the NY Times article.
If you can't forget about it, then visit the museum's website.

--See you later, Patty