2008 Conference Slated for Albany, April 13-15

Emlyn Koster PhD, President and CEO, Liberty Science Center to Keynote 2008 Upstate History Alliance/Museum Association of New York Annual Conference, Albany   Relevancy-Driven Considerations for Museum-Community Relationships will be topic of his remarks.

At the centennial conference of the American Association of Museums, the Harvard Business School's renowned strategist Michael Porter advocated that museums be clear about their niche in society's value chain. Arguing that this is indeed a new imperative for museums in order that they be both relevant and sustainable, this presentation probes what is the needed new menu of reflections about museum-community relationships.

Emlyn Koster, a science museum CEO for the past two decades, is at the helm of one of the museum field’s most relevancy-minded institutions. Internationally experienced and dedicated to improving the links between science and society, he is a prominent writer and speaker about the external responsibilities of science museums, as well as an active contributor to their main professional bodies.

President and CEO of Liberty Science Center since 1996, he has led the institution in a demand-driven $109 million capital project under the banner of Connections: Our Community, Our World. In partnership with the region's public and private sectors, this encompasses major expansion and renovation as well as extensive exhibition and program enhancement. New Jersey’s most visited museum and one of the New York City metro region’s top-rated cultural destinations, Liberty Science Center is in Liberty State Park, Jersey City, next to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. Opened in 1993 and reopened on July 19, 2007, its innovative benchmarks for the science museum field feature inclusive approaches to audience, regional relevancy of exhibitions, offsite and online content, extensive involvement with preK -12 education and teacher professional development, and instructive applications of videoconferencing and cell phones. Following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the Center assisted in a wide variety of emergency roles that went on to shape thinking in the museum field about different roles when disaster strikes.

New York's First Lady to Welcome Conference Attendees
Silda Wall Spitzer will join the conference on Monday morning, April 14th for a brief welcome to conference attendees.  Ms. Spitzer is a former trustee of the Children's Museum of Manhattan.  "We are delighted that Ms. Spitzer is taking time from her busy schedule to address the conference," said Anne Ackerson, MANY Director, "Given the First Lady's interest in arts and cultural institutions, our venue is a perfect opportunity for her to see the breadth and depth of museums in this state."

Closing Keynoter Named
Philip Morris, CEO of Proctors Theater in Schenectady and a leading cultural entrepreneur in the Capital District, will share his thoughts on Tuesday morning, April 15, about community relevancy.  Proctors Theater is the leading downtown anchor in the revitalization of Schenectady and Morris has taken the lead in making it so.  Read Philip's blog to find out what's on his mind.

Student Poster Session Proposals
This year, we seek proposals for poster sessions from undergraduate and graduate students that explore the explore aspects related to our theme of "The Relevancy-Drive Museum."  We are interested in creating a provocative and diverse program for this conference, and welcome proposals that explore all aspects of museums and communities, including but not limited to collections, exhibitions, education/outreach, development, administration, governance. Poster Session proposals are due on February 15, 2008. For more information, click here.

Seeking Student Volunteers
Volunteer 4 Hours…Receive Free Conference Registration! A limited number of undergraduate and graduate student volunteer slots are available at the upcoming UHA/MANY Annual Conference on April 13-15, 2008 at the Albany Marriott on Wolf Road and at several off-site locations around the Albany area. For more information, contact Jenny Rosenzweig, Program Coordinator, at 800.895.1648; jenny@upstatehistory.org

Sponsorship Opportunities Available
Is your company or organization looking for ways to reach out to museum staff and volunteers? Become a sponsor of the Upstate History Alliance/Museum Association of New York Annual Conference! For more information, click here.

2007 Annual Meeting and Conference Wrap-Up
April 15-17 2007, Syracuse

The snow in Syracuse on Monday morning; Keynote Speaker Tom Phelps, National Endowment for the Humanities

What People Were Talking About....
Worried that your historic house is exhibiting symptoms of decline? Donna Ann Harris’ session, New Solutions for House Museums: Two Case Studies, provided a quick checklist:

• Dwindling attendance

• Cash flow problems

• Maintenance issues

• Difficulty in replacing the board chair

• A shift in focus from public programs to keeping the doors open

• A leadership in denial

“The only thing that can save a house is excellence.”
Kenneth Shefsiek, director of the Geneva Historical Society, and panelist in Harris' session.

“The National Endowment for the Humanities will support large exhibitions, up to one million dollars, that include a strong component Web site or other ways to digitally enhance programming. We’re looking for interesting, dynamic and educational exhibits.

The NEH believes digital technology is an unprecedented way to bring information to scholars and that digitization is crucial to the preservation of fragile documents."
Tom Phelps, Director of Public Programs, National Endowment for the Humanities, in his keynote speech

MANY Director Anne Ackerson with Jeffrey Cannell, Deputy Commissioner for Cultural Education, State Education Department

“Thinking deep and hard about museums, are you just a job training program or is it really academic?”
A graduate student from Ontario and a member of the audience at the graduate studies workshop

“We’ve worked over the years on the funding piece and strengthened the integration of our program within the university. But to go back to the issue of pay and benefits, if we’re paying at dreadful rates, then the monkey’s on our back. We identified the worst pay situations [in our institution] and put money there. Until more of us do that, until more of us raise endowment all the time, these are the choices you have to make.”
Steve Elliott, President of NYSHA in response to questions about low salaries for emerging museum employees.

“We as a field are very talented. We all have incredible value that is not always recognized by the institutions we work for.”
Erin Crissman, Curator, Historic Cherry Hill, Albany

L-R: Joyce Latham, Executive Director, Onondaga County Public Library System; Tom Greenfield, Professor of English and Special Advisor to the President, SUNY Geneseo; Pamela Green, Executive Director, Weeksville Heritage Center in session on Building a Cultural Community: Collaboration and Connection in the Public Humanities (Sponsored by the New York Council for the Humanities)

“This is a session about how we in the broader humanities community can work together to make sure we matter, to know to whom we matter, and if we don’t, then why?”
Pamela E. Green, Executive Director, Weeksville Heritage Center, Brooklyn

“I don’t think a visitor can use his imagination if you haven’t used yours.”
Leslie Bedford, Director, Leadership in Museum Education Program, Bank Street College, in her closing address

Our thanks to our conference partners:
New York Council for the Humanities
New York State Council on the Arts
New York State Historical Association

Sally Roesch Wagner, Executive Director of the Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation (Fayetteville) and MANY Board Member Pamela Green share some serious conversation over breakfast; MANY Board Member Bart Roselli tied up in raffle tickets

2006 Annual Meeting Wrap-up
The city of Saratoga Springs welcomed some 200 museum staff, volunteers and trustees April 9 and 10 when the Museum Association of New York (MANY) joined the Upstate History Alliance (UHA) at the Gideon Putnam Hotel for their joint annual meeting. With a theme of “It’s About People” conference-goers participated in round table discussions, listened to speakers, and attended business meetings for both organizations. In between, they bid on a wide variety of silent auction items assembled by UHA, chatted with friends, or visited the avenue of exhibitors.

Our thanks to our conference partner, the Upstate History Alliance, for flawlessly coordinating hundreds of people and thousands of details to make this year’s meeting a success. 

Panel Shares Life Experiences
Following the morning’s business meetings and an introductory greeting by the mayor of Saratoga, Valerie Keehn, attendees had a choice of several sessions. One of the most popular was MANY’s session, “Museum Leadership: A Multi-Generational Perspective,” moderated by Nicholas Westbrook, former MANY board president and director of Fort Ticonderoga, that attracted a standing room only crowd.

Leadership panelists at UHA/MANY conference:  Buzz Hartshorn, Matt Braun, Joy Houle, Carol Enseki.  (photo by Joan Baldwin)

It’s About Research, It’s About Change
James Chung, President of Reach Advisors, a Boston-based marketing firm took center stage at the MANY/UHA annual meeting April 10, delivering the keynote address. Chung, whose firm specializes in studying changes in American households for its corporate clients turned the conference theme—“It’s About People”—inside out, offering clues about audience behavior based on market research.

Chung’s research is based on a study of 10,000 households, examining leisure time shifts, generational shifts, family attitudes and community engagement. In addition, in preparation for his talk, Chung surveyed 100 MANY/UHA members. Their survey answers were incorporated into Chung’s talk as well.

“Museums and historical organizations able to address change in families and communities were thriving,” Chung said about his MANY/UHA survey. Of the organizations responding to Chung’s survey, 75 percent offer family programs while another 20 percent are interested in offering them. Twenty-two percent reported steady growth and perhaps more importantly those organizations attributed growth to changes they had made. An almost equal number reported decreasing visitation. Those organizations attributed declining numbers to changes in their audience.

“Why is serving families more challenging?” Chung asked. His answer: That there is a generational sea change going on as population with young children shifts from baby boomers to Generation Xers. “Generation X isn’t following the pattern of their boomer parents,” Chung reported. GenX moms, he said, are much more likely to have established careers, leave their hometowns, marry late and have kids later. GenX moms are more likely to stay at home with their children and their spouses are far less likely to identify themselves with their careers than men in the previous generation. In fact, Chung reported that GenX dads have doubled the time spent with their families.

“Dads may be changing,” Chung said. “But 80 percent of children are still enrolled [in museum programs] by their mothers.” Interestingly, only six percent of museums target mothers specifically in their advertising.  “You need a focus to make a dent,” Chung pointed out. His recommendation: Programming that’s for kids or with kids with less flash and more back to basics. “Period baseball is a slam dunk,” he said, showing an image from Genesee Country Museum & Village, one of the survey respondents. According to Chung’s surveys, sports and outdoor activities top GenXers list of favorite activities.

“Teenage girls aren’t the only ones using word of mouth,” Chung quipped. “Moms 35 to 40 years old use it too.

“A percentage of the audience are sneezers,” he continued. “They’re the ones that spread the message.” Not only do GenXers use word of mouth, but email as well, and they have the highest use of community newspapers of any age group. The message for museums?  Rethink ad placement, moving ads from higher priced dailies to weeklies. Be aggressive with email lists and design them so they can be forwarded, Chung suggested. It’s social currency that will make GenX parents forward an email message and parents can measure a museum’s interest in families on something as simple as whether bathrooms have changing tables or whether there is a quiet room for nursing babies.

Community is another area driven by generational change. According to Chung, 74 percent of GenXers say they want to make contributions to their communities. How can museums take advantage of that? Chung’s response is by blocking and tackling. “Host community events in order to find a better programming fit to align with community needs.”

The other mantra for building community is partnership. “Partnerships are the new DNA of community building,” Chung said. “Partnerships bring new financial support, and new visitors and pull organizations into the present.” In closing he praised Matt Braun (director) and The History Center of Tompkins County for its creative use of partners.

MANY Board Elections Announced
During the business meeting portion of the conference, MANY President Stephen W. Clark announced the outcome of MANY board elections.   Re-elected to a second term as Vice President, John Haworth, Director, Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian’s George Gustav Heye Center, NYC.  Re-elected to two-year officer terms:  Patricia Sands, museum trustee from Oyster Bay, Secretary and Lyle Beach, Sr. Vice President for Finance at the Strong Museum, Treasurer.

Elected to the Class of 2009: Returning for a second three-year term:  Jack Braunlein (Director of Lyndhurst, Tarrytown); Michael Botwinick (Director of the Hudson River Museum, Yonkers); Pamela E. Green (Executive Director of the Weeksville Heritage Center, Brooklyn); and Betsy W. Harrison (President & CEO of the Genesee Country Village & Museum, Mumford).

Elected to their first three-year term:  Elizabeth Barker (Director of the Picker Art Gallery, Colgate University); Steven Elliott (President of The Farmers’ Museum/New York State Historical Association, Cooperstown); Joy Houle (Executive Director of Brookside Museum/Saratoga County Historical Society, Ballston Spa); Cynthia Lee, (Deputy Director of Programs at the Museum of the Chinese in the Americas, NYC); Kristin E.M. Riemer (External Affairs Officer at the University at Buffalo Art Galleries).

MANY welcomes new board members Joy Houle, Kristin E.M. Riemer, Elizabeth Barker, and D. Stephen Elliott.  (photo by Joan Baldwin)

Our thanks to MANY board members who have left our ranks this last year:  David Chesebrough, former President of the Buffalo Museum of Science; Catherine Fukushima, formerly of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Beth Levinthal, Executive Director of the Heckscher Museum of Art; and Julia Rose, former CEO of the St. Lawrence Aquarium and Ecological Center.

2005 Keynote by Spencer Crew

Where We Have Been and Where We Are Headed:  Navigating the 21^st Century

Spencer R. Crew, PhD
President and CEO
National Underground Railroad Freedom Center

Museums throughout time constantly have debated their role as educational institutions and their relationship to their audiences.  This discussion is core to determining what value we provide as institutions.  While education consistently has been seen as one of our most important tasks, the form that education should take has not always been as self-evident.  The choices have ranged from using the Socratic method of teaching to adopting a more authoritarian approach.  In simpler terms, the question was whether the task of museums was to understand and respond to the interests of visitors or whether museums had the responsibility to expose visitors to artifacts and ideas which they may not request but that they need to know.  In the latter case it meant museums should act as very knowledgeable tutors who lead their student down the road to enlightenment even when the student did not really show an interest. 

Often the final decision about the relationship museums embraced with regard to their audience depended on where the institution believed its best chances of success lay.  Some of the earliest museums focused on visitors as customers and as critical revenue sources.  They believed that education could be and should be entertaining and engaging as well as profitable.   These institutions sought to create experiences which attracted people who came because as customers they believed what was offered was worth the price of admission.  Places like the Peale Museum in Philadelphia and the American Museum in New York followed this strategy.  Charles Peale and P. T. Barnum were both entrepreneurs committed to finding ways to attract visitors to their institutions because of the power of the objects and the environments they created around them.  They thought about the preferences of visitors first as they crafted the presentations in their museums and marketed them to the public.  They believed that education did not have to be grueling or boring, but could be enjoyable and still be effective.[i]

Later museums did not follow this same path.  As their key supporters shifted from the general public to the wealthy movers and shakers of society their focused changed.  More museums began to see themselves as the preservers and reinforcers of prevailing cultural values.  Consequently, their goal became to highlight the quality of the artifacts they had in their collections as well as to create awe and reverence for the cultures which created them.  In the process, they wanted to reinforce the idea of the steady improvement of American society and technology.  These institutions believed their duty to their visitors was to expose them to the values and cultural norms intertwined in these objects.  This meant their larger task was to collect and preserve important cultural icons.  Their most important audience was not the general public, but the patrons who supported the acquisition and preservation of the artifacts. Museum staff focused in this manner worked hard on improving professional standards for the field.  In the process they sought to show they could properly care for and study these objects and were worthy of the trust placed in them by donors.  The educational goal in this case was to increase their knowledge of the objects and to illustrate their importance as cultural icons. [ii]  How the general public felt about these objects was less important than having the artifacts available to illustrate important concepts visitors should know about the world in which they lived.  If the public was wise enough to take advantage of what the museums had to offer that was good.  If they did not make use of the opportunity it was their misfortune and bad judgment. 

            While not every museum followed this pattern precisely, this mode of increasing professionalization characterized the trajectory of the museum field for much of the twentieth century.  The objects, the exhibitions, and the programs produced were directed toward reinforcing traditional history, mainstream culture, and knowledge while ignoring non-traditional perspectives.  The lives and the material culture of the successful, the movers and shakers, and the wealthy dominated the narratives presented by these institutions.  There were exceptions like the Newark Museum directed by John Cotton Dana, who believed museums needed to be more responsive to the general public.  But, this perspective was not in the majority. 

            The manner in which museums viewed their relationship with the general public did not begin to shift again until the latter part of the twentieth century.  Then a number of factors came into play to cause the change.  Sources of funding support for these institutions began to broaden as local and national governmental funding increased in importance.  These agencies were interested in how cultural institutions they supported served their local communities and asked them to show the impact they were having.  National foundations followed a similar pattern as they wanted to maximize the impact of the dollars they provided cultural organizations.  In addition, visitors were demanding that museums broaden the topics and the artifacts they highlighted in their presentations.  Civil rights activists across the nation raised important questions about whose culture, whose history, whose narrative was included in these institutions.  These potential customers were not content to see only traditional interpretations.  They wanted the discussion broadened and made more diverse and inclusive.  At the same time, new scholarship in the academy offered information about the contributions many people had made to this country. The history of African Americans, Latinos, Asian Pacific Americans, women, American Indians and numerous other groups experienced a renaissance as their stories and contributions became more readily available. [iii]  Representatives of those groups wanted this information included in the narrative featured in museums.   They felt excluding their stories created a biased image of the American cultural story. This for them was not acceptable. 

            As the pressure mounted museums began to adjust and think more about the rich variety of stories they could access and include in their presentations.  They began to recognize that if they were to remain relevant as institutions in a rapidly evolving world they needed to embrace new ideas and new perspectives.  One of the first illustrations of this new thinking was the publication in 1984 of Museums for a New Century by the American Association of Museums.  The core message it highlighted was the importance of pluralism in American society and the responsibility of museums to recognize and help translate its meaning to its visitors.  They acknowledged this was not a simple task as it sometimes meant mediating competing points of view.  However, they saw it as an essential role which museums should not and could not ignore. 

            Another publication by AAM in 1992 reinforced the ideas set forth in Museums for a New Century and carried them further.  Excellence and Equity: Education and the Public Dimensions of Museums encouraged museums to shift the paradigm of how they saw their relationship with their audiences.  It emphasized the educational role of museums in the broadest sense and promoted more collaboration between museums and their visitors.  The authors strongly believed museums no longer could position themselves as the all knowing sources of authority who knew best what their visitors should learn and did not need to ask their opinions.  Instead, their argument was that partnerships made more sense.  Partnerships which respected the knowledge brought to the conversation by all of the participants and which incorporated that collective perspective into the exhibitions and programs created by the museums. 

            The good news is that rather than stubbornly resisting the idea many institutions began to take more seriously the concerns and opinions of their visitors.  They recognized that the changing demographics of the communities in which they were located demanded more flexibility if they were to remain viable.  The leisure time options available for potential visitors were expanding rapidly.  Sporting events, concerts, theater, and numerous other activities gave visitors many more choices.  The challenge for museums was how to insure they remained high in value as people made choices.  Asking visitors what interested them and including them in the decision making process in creating new activities helped.  If visitors saw their history and culture, their stories in the museums they were much more likely to visit and to see value in the work of these institutions. Many subsequent gatherings of museum professionals spent numerous sessions examining and probing the ideas presented in the report.

As it turned out this argument for a different relationship with audiences had merit as the popularity of museums, many of whom began to embrace this new mindset, climbed upward in the years which followed.  A conference at the White House in 1995 on travel and tourism illustrated the growing importance of cultural institutions in the eyes of the public.  In a report on how people spent their time while on vacation some interesting facts surfaced.  There were certain key activities which consistently topped the list for vacation travelers.  Number one on the list of activities was shopping.  In many ways this is not at all surprising.  But, second on the list was visiting cultural institutions such as museums, science centers, zoos, or cultural festivals.  The report pointed out that people liked to go to these institutions because they offered experiences which vacationers felt enriched the quality of their visit and deepened their understanding of the history and culture of the area.   In response to this statistic tourism bureaus indicated they intended to more actively feature museums as one of the highlights of their states.

The popularity of museums continued to rise in the years which followed as a study published by the AAM in 2001 illustrated.  The report found that visits to museums of all types had reached about 865 million per year.  This meant that about one-third of Americans said they had visited a museum, aquarium, science or technology center or a zoo within the past six months.  Nearly a quarter of Americans had gone to one of these places in the past year and 1 in 5 had been there more than a year ago.  This data was notable as it indicated that at the time of the report attending museums was one of the most popular things people did.  It had not reached the level of attendance at sporting events, like auto racing for example, but it was rising in importance.  This was great news for museums and reason for them to feel excited about the future and their place as significant institutions in the eyes of the public.

            In the light of these studies someone looking at the state of the field in 2001 might have seen a very positive future.  But, circumstances change quickly and so did the environment for museums.  Most significantly the events of September 11, 2001 shook the nation as well as our institutions.  This catastrophe paired with a weakening economy had a dramatic impact upon attendance at museums and their viability.  Sites like Colonial Williamsburg and the Smithsonian Institution witnessed significant slumps in their visitorship, sales and consequently income. Other museums across the country witnessed similar reductions in visitorship and income.  The recovery from these setbacks has been slow for museums.  It has created a reason for us to look again at our relationship to our visitors and to consider very seriously the challenges of operating a museum in the 21^st century.  In many ways as we think about the state of the field presently, this truly is the core issue:  How do we position ourselves as relevant social entities in a world that has changed significantly in just the last five years and will continue to change?

            Wrestling with this question returns us to the issue of our role as educational institutions and the nature of the relationship we need to forge with our visitors.  The ideas put forth in Museums for a New Century and Excellence and Equity are still important cornerstones in this conversation about audiences.  What increases the complexity of the discussion is the necessity of expanding the definition of diversity and how we think about this concept in the broadest possible way.  In the 21st century diversity is about more than race, gender, and ethnicity which were the most often discussed focal points ten or more years ago.  A new array of characteristics like age, learning styles, and computer literacy are all variables which need inclusion under an expanded rubric of diversity.

             At core, the challenge is how we as institutions engage new ideas, new ways of doing things, and new modes of communication.  In earlier discussions discomfort often sprang from moving away from traditional ways of doing things and opening oneself up to new possibilities.  This is not to argue that traditional ways of operating do not have value.  But, they are not the only way to see and connect to the world and our audiences.  The challenge is how to seek out and use the best of the old and the new.  It also is to make the effort to explore what approaches are most effective in consolidating the relationship between our institutions and our audiences.  We need to find ways to provide experiences for our visitors which has meaning in their lives and positions our organizations as places which have a relevant societal role to play.

            Often the hardest step is to allow oneself to move into uncomfortable territory.  A good example is a project recently done by the Chicago Historical Society.  It began as an effort to capture what it meant to be a teenager in Chicago over the years.  The initial approach was pretty straightforward.  They would use students from across the city to conduct oral histories with older residents about their experiences as teenagers in Chicago.  The students were to explore what teenagers thought about, wore, listened to, and how they lived in the past.  The Historical Society saw this as a great way to study the history of the city through a unique perspective.  It also thought it was a nice way to make history come alive for the students doing the interviews. 

            What the staff at the Historical Society did a bit differently was to make the teenagers they recruited partners in the project from the very start.  This “Teen Council” helped fashion the questions, selected who they would interview, and offered ideas on how to share the information they acquired with the public.  The results were much different then the staff could have imagined.  The students became very enthusiastic about the project and began to infuse it with their own ideas and views of how to do things.  In particular, they wanted a say in how the exhibition resulting from the interviews was going to look.  The issue for the staff was to what degree they were willing to share their control over the exhibition and the programs to accompany it.  To their credit they choose to give the students a lot of latitude with the design and execution of the project.  The student’s influence ranged from the colors used, to the musical style, to the presentation techniques.  The resulting exhibition had an aesthetic much more recognizable and inviting for a younger generation.  It was not what the typical visitor might expect at a place like the Chicago Historical Society.  The show was very much in a style familiar to the MTV generation.  The colors were bright, the music often livelier and the modes of presentation innovative.  For example, they presented some of their interviews on screens set in lockers like the ones used by students in high school. 

            The programming around the exhibition also followed a different direction as the activities were heavily teen oriented.  They had poetry slams, rap performers, as well as break dancers and skateboarders outside the building on different occasions.  The goal was to make the exhibition and more importantly the building feel user friendly and inviting to teenage visitors.  For example, at events like the poetry slam extra uniformed guards were not put in place, despite concerns about possible violence.  The staff felt it more important to let students attending the events see that the Historical Society was treating them like any other guests coming to an event in the building. 

            The results were gratifying for the institution.  Teens flocked to the museum to see the work of their colleagues as well as to experience this exhibition which talked about issues of interest to them.  They began to see the museum as a teen friendly place.  It no longer was the staid, threatening building they once pictured.  Their increased attendance helped led to a dramatic increase in the visitorship to the Historical Society.

             Thus, despite the worry of some of the more traditional supporters of the Historical Society and some staff, the experiment paid dividends.  The exhibition and related programming illustrated the importance of listening seriously to and responding to the interests of your audiences.  It also showed how to identify new audiences and the success which can follow when they feel included and welcomed.  This is neither an easy process nor a comfortable one.  To achieve success our institution must be ready to travel in new directions and commit to truly sharing the process of creating new experiences within the building.  If we are to remain relevant and engaging entities this is one of the commitments we will have to make as the twenty-first century stretches before us.

            We also will need to look more closely at the issue of fully integrating technology and innovation into our visitor experience.  This is still an area of debate in the field.  An example is a recent discussion among AAM colleagues about an award for which several museums had been nominated.  The awards were sponsored by the Themed Attraction Association in recognition of innovation in presentation within these institutions.  A very lively discussion ensued concerning how people felt about the issue of getting recognition from the “theme park” world.  The debate was grounded in the question of the differences between museums and places like Disney Land.  Some people were not at all bothered by the connection and in fact embraced the concept that there was much we could benefit from emulating some of the things done at these parks.  Others firmly believed that the association was not good.  They felt museums would suffer in the comparison and lose their unique identity.  In their view museums could not compete on the “gee whiz” level with for profit theme parks.  The resources the parks could put into their experiences were far greater than museums had available.  Also, by not focusing on our special characteristics we were putting ourselves in jeopardy. One of the special aspects of museums was the artifacts, the content, and the context they provided visitors.  Most theme parks could not match this expertise and museums should play to their strengths rather than trying to emulate the things theme parks did best.

             This is a debate that could go on forever.  In fact it is an issue that has stretched over many years.  But, in the twenty-first century I believe it is taking on a new urgency.  In an age of sophisticated technology and information rich environments museums cannot afford to sit on the sidelines.  Computers, technology, touch screens, film, and interactives are the norm in today’s world.  They impact nearly every aspect of our lives.  This is even truer when we think about younger visitors to our institutions.  They have been raised on this technology and are extremely comfortable with it.  They expect to have access to information in a variety of forms and formats.  Technology is second nature to them.  They are use to obtaining large chunks of information and using technology to receive it and to manipulate it.  They are not alone in this mind set as more and more retired visitors are using and becoming comfortable with technology as well.  They use it to buy airplane tickets, to pre-plan vacations and to send emails to children and more importantly grandchildren.  More and more for them technology is just another tool.

            This reality does not leave many options for museums.  Technology has to be among the choices available to our visitors.  And, we need to use that technology in creative ways.  It is not enough to have it serve as an alternative way to present labels or information in greater depth.  This is no more exciting than reading a long label attached to the wall.  In fact reading it on a computer screen can be even more annoying and not the best use of the medium.  The wonderful aspect of technology is that it has tremendous flexibility and opportunities for creativity.  At its best, technology has the ability to draw visitors into ideas and topics they might not have investigated otherwise.  It can reveal the awe and wonder many of us find in the material we work with and use, but which may not have the same innate appeal to others.  We need to look closely at how we leverage technology to our advantage. 

            Effective education and engagement does not come in one prescribed format.  Traditional approaches can intersect with less traditional techniques in very effective and appealing ways.  This can in the end cause visitors to spend more time in our institutions and to want to return.  Science Centers and children’s museums have been very smart about this issue.  By using technology and hands-on learning environments they have provided new illustrations of ways to connect to visitors.  More traditional institutions need to look at these examples and find ways to apply them in their own settings.  Even when it feels a little like we are getting close to feeling like “theme parks.”

            An example is the environmental theater which is part of the experience at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati.  Instead of creating a traditional film experience or an I-MAX theater the decision was to construct an environment which allows visitors to join a young women running from Kentucky to Ohio to Canada on the Underground Railroad.  The setting is a wooded area along the banks of the Ohio River looking from the Kentucky side of the river into Ohio.  Visitors are seated as they enter in a wooded setting.  Trees, stars, chirping crickets, owls, fog from the river and fire flies surround them as they take their seats.  Once settled the drama begins as they join the fleeing woman who is hotly pursued by slave catchers and baying dogs.  In the process of her adventure shots are fired, she plunges into the river and eventually makes contact with black and white participants in the Underground Railroad.  During the escape visitors come to understand how truly dangerous it is to participate in this endeavor and that the outcome is not guaranteed. 

            Oprah Winfrey is the narrator of this very powerful and moving experience for visitors.  It brings to life the realities of the Underground Railroad in a very forceful way.  Visitor reaction to the presentation has been uniformly positive.  In surveys of visitors it is one of the highest rated activities in the Freedom Center.  People comment on how real the experience feels and how it allows them to connect to the Underground Railroad experience in a very unexpected, but engrossing way.  In short they learned something new as a result of the experience.  The technology is a useful and powerful tool which has enhanced the visitor experience and that experience has not suffered because of its similarity to theme parks experiences.

            Technology is not an evil in itself and neither is the use of immersive environments, high end technology, or creative media applications.  They are simply tools available to us as we find ways to better connect with visitors.  We should not retreat from or avoid experimentation in these areas.  Rather we need to seek creative ways to integrate these tools within our institutions to add to the power of the information we are providing visitors.  We need to remain open to looking at techniques used by entities other than museums.  There are lessons worth learning there which can be successfully applied or modified in our places.  This can be done while still maintaining the special attributes of our institutions.  Tried and true techniques of presentation still have their usefulness, but they also have their limitations.  Today’s visitors are much more sophisticated in their expectations and if we fail to rise to the challenge we risk losing our value and importance.  Potential visitors have many options concerning how and where they will spend their leisure dollars.  The things which influence those choices in one direction versus another are often intangible and subtle.  Museums must take advantage of every opportunity to make their offerings difficult for potential visitors to bypass.

            These considerations also extend to the intellectual and emotional style in which we approach the information we present.  We need to be provocative, questioning, and emotionally impactful.  This does not have to dominate every presentation we make, but it does need to be a part of the array of ideas present in our institutions.  As educators our goals in part should be to sharpen the critical thinking skills of our visitors.  We need to offer them ways of viewing the world which help them navigate it as well as find avenues through which they can, if they choose, make an impact. 

            The experiences of the past decade or so can make taking steps in this direction feel a bit nerve wracking.  The cultural wars of the 1990s certainly made many museums cautious.  The controversies which emerged over exhibitions at the National Air and Space Museum, The Library of Congress, the Museum of the City of New York and the Royal Ontario Museum to name a few were sobering.  Individuals bothered by the content and interpretations of the exhibitions in these institutions certainly made life difficult for the museums’ staff.  But, it is also true that there were many others who supported these presentations and found them informative and quite appropriate.  It is important that the voices of dissent do not totally drown out what may be the larger percentage, the silent majority, of our visitors.

            A recent survey of museum visitors argues that visitor expectations may be more varied than we believe.  A poll conducted of museum visitors in Canada and Australia showed that 70% thought it was appropriate for museums to look at contentious topics.  For them the key was in how the presentations were positioned.  They wanted museums to give them the information on all sides of the controversy.  They wanted the opportunity to analyze the information themselves and to perform their own sorting of the data.  Then, if the museum presentation offered its perspective, the visitor could decide for themselves what they thought about that point of view. 

            But, there is a further step that we can consider as we look at what additional value museums can provide.  This is the opportunity to actively encourage visitors to contemplate their role and place in the world.  To think about the challenges and responsibilities that lay before them as concerned and hopefully involved world citizens.  Embracing this task carries museums into a more heavily proscriptive role than they have normally adopted.  It gets them involved in openly offering value judgments and seeking to shape directly the way visitors think about civic engagement and responsibility.  It entails strongly encouraging visitors to believe that their decisions can have a positive impact in shaping the places where they live.  They can make a difference if they choose to do so.

            In adopting this philosophy and mission museums are consciously positioning themselves as places of transformation.  Institutions who believe they can impact how their visitors connect to and engage with their fellow citizens and the society of which they are a part.  This is not a role many museums embraced previously.  We saw our primary role to inform, perhaps to offer new perspectives, but not to aggressively advocate civic engagement.  However, there are museums where this perspective is changing and who argue that our responsibilities need to change in this new century.

            There are a number of institutions now in existence who describe themselves as “museums of conscience” and have embraced this much more aggressive and proscriptive posture.  The leading institution among them is the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.  Its mission includes the task “to encourage its visitors to reflect upon the moral and spiritual questions raised by the events of the Holocaust as well as their own responsibilities as citizens of democracy.”    There is no doubt in these words that through its presentations the Holocaust Museum takes a very clear point of view with the intent of emphasizing the responsibility we each have to prevent injustices like the Holocaust from occurring again.  This is not just their goal for a single exhibition, but it is the mission of the institution.  It is not neutral on this subject, but rather quite forthright and forceful about the lessons it wants its visitors to embrace. 

There are other institutions like the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, the Museum of Tolerance, the Lower Eastside Tenement Museum, and the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center which have followed similar paths with their missions.  Each uses their exhibitions and programs as platforms for illustrating past inequities with the goal of showing what can happen when engaged and committed citizens’ work to create a more justice society.  They show their visitors that the choices they make with regard to others can have an impact.  Further they are saying that a socially responsible citizen finds ways to get engaged and to make a difference.  These institutions are seeking to inspire their visitors to understand that their decisions can have consequences which make the world a better place.   They are seeking to touch the conscience of their visitors and remind them of their responsibilities to others.

To take this position does entail some risk.  There are organizations and interest groups who disapprove of the stands taken by these institutions.  And some of these groups are quite influential.  But, these “museums of conscience” have determined that the message they offer is important enough to risk the negative reactions they might receive.  Their belief is that there is a strong interest from the majority of their visitors for this very clear message.  What they firmly believe they are providing is guidance and ideas for people as they seek to navigate a very complex and sometimes confusing world.  They believe they are serving as reference points to help their visitors find ways to add more value and meaning to their lives.  In a world that has changed significantly over the past few years more people are looking for ways to navigate this new landscape and to add meaning through the choices they make.  “Museums of conscience” believe they can offer guideposts to help in this journey.   It is certainly an idea that other institutions may want to consider as they look to the future. 

It is not necessary to create new institutions in order to generate meaningful civic dialogues like at the Holocaust Museum.  Numerous places have crafted thoughtful programs and exhibitions which generate similar experiences for their visitors.  The goal is to provide a broader context for the topic presented.  Visitors are then encouraged to think about and express their reactions.  The Henry Art Gallery at the University of Washington, the Wasdworth Athenaeum, the Andy Warhol Museum, and the Japanese American Museum have all had successful activities using this approach and are places we might look at more closely.[iv]

There are no guarantees that the different directions suggested here such as emulating museums of conscience, experimenting with technology or closer/stronger partnerships with our visitors will prove the keys for success.  There is no blueprint for creating a powerful and valuable experience for our audiences.   History has told us that much.  Audience expectations and needs change from era to era, as have the positioning of museums.  Our work is very much an art form where one must have the willingness and ability to improvise.  Experimentation is not something to fear, but to embrace.

  What is true is that we are now part of an era where change is constant. The ideas which hold sway one minute are subject to revision and new interpretation the next. The world is very different now than it was five years ago.   Our audiences have come to expect this constant movement and change.  They are not always comfortable with it, but they recognize the reality of it.

In the light of this environment it is essential that our institutions have flexibility and a willingness to experiment.   They need to think about and stay ahead of the needs of our audiences and consider the best way to respond to and provide for those needs.  It is how they will continue to create value as institutions.  And, this is the biggest challenge we face as twenty-first century institutions.  We must stay attuned to our audiences and their needs.   Our audiences are changing and evolving and we must change along with them.  In many ways we need to update and follow the efforts of our predecessors like Charles Peale and John Cotton Dana who kept their ears attuned to the preferences and needs of their visitors.  They understood doing this demanded constant learning and a willingness to accept the missteps that come with the process.  Here is a tradition well worth preserving.    It is a lesson from the past which will be critical to our success as we go forward. The path it may push our institutions to follow will not always be a comfortable one for many of us. But it is important that we learn to live with that discomfort.  It is the same lack of surety our visitors are experiencing navigating this new century.  In this way we will share that journey with them and hopefully provide learning and growth along the way which proves invaluable to everyone.

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