Shaping the Future
Strategies for Promoting Pre-Service Teachers’ Comfortability with Musuem-Based Learning Activities as a Way to Increase Museum Accessibility and Attendance for Young Children and Their Families
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Lauren Burrow
Since 2021, the presenter/researcher, an education studies professor at a public, rural university in East Texas (USA), has led multiple ½-day-long "field trips” to a visual arts museum for elementary education pre-service teachers (PSTs) and their friends and family members. During each field trip, the first-time museum patrons (i.e., the PSTs and their friends/family) have completed interactive activities designed by the presenter to promote interdisciplinary, place-based learning. At the conclusion of each field trip, the PST patrons have completed exit surveys in which they self-evaluate changes in their (1) attitudes towards and perceptions about museum visits and (2) awareness around and confidence in how to integrate museum visits into broader learning experiences for young children (Kindergarten – 6th grade) and their families. This action research study examines the longitudinal data collected from the 60 exit surveys and will share researcher-recommended strategies and activities that museum staff can implement in order to assist future teachers to feel more comfortable and confident in museum spaces with the ultimate goal of increasing the likelihood that those teachers will pursue future partnerships with museums for the promotion of experience / place-based art education for young students. We encourage those in charge of museum visitor experiences to consider how investment in university-museum partnerships that promote wider inclusivity and attendance at museums by PSTs can potentially encourage life-long museum patronage by young children and their families.
Living Archive: Student-Centered Curatorial Practices from a Design Education Perspective
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Melanie May, Elsa Franco Franco
Since 2015, the School of Design at Universidad de Los Andes has organized two exhibitions to showcase student work: Andando, which presents undergraduate course projects, and Volarán, which highlights notable degree projects. Although curatorship has rotated among professors, a repetitive exhibition format, the absence of a generational voice, and limited leadership and student involvement in the setup of the exhibitions, were identified as key challenges. To address these issues, the study proposes a curatorial methodology that actively involves students in every stage of the process. The approach was structured into three stages: a closed call for submissions directed to top students; a series of activities with the selected participants to define thematic lines; and a joint curatorial and museographic process led by two faculty curators. The aim of this process was to consolidate the exhibitions as spaces for collective learning, where students collaboratively constructed curatorial discourses, while dynamically and progressively appropriating the exhibition space. Over the course of two years and four cohorts, the method was implemented proved to succeed in fostering students’ curiosity and imagination by highlighting their inquiries and discoveries; showcasing their proposals in both exhibitions, while celebrating the diversity of their perspectives and creative dialogues; and transcending curricular structures, reflecting the students’ persistent desire to better understand the world around them, from a disciplinary perspective. Thus, the initiative redefines the concept of curatorship as a pedagogical device with a professionalizing orientation, recognizing speculation and practice as fundamental components of academic formation.
Featured Engaging Stakeholders, Shaping the Future: Innovative Strategies for Museum Management
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Gesualda Iodice, Francesco Bifulco
This study investigates the effects generated by the interaction of museums with the reference community. The research is centered on analyzing and evaluating stakeholder strategies employed by a single case study, the National Archaeological Museum of Naples (MANN) through a gap analysis based on the investigation of three main drivers: identity, image, and reputation. The research adopts a qualitative approach implemented through action research. Specifically, the authors submitted a semi-structured questionnaire to a shortlist of selected Opinion Leaders. The evidence returns a photograph of cultural institutions perceived as places of welcome and inclusiveness, a cultural hub around whose core gravitates multiple heterogeneous networks that share the mission of urban regeneration and artistic dissemination. Therefore, this study offers cultural institutions as value-creating attractors of social, cultural, economic, and qualifiable as (a) connectivity enablers; (b) aggregators; and (c) activators of relational places, in physical and virtual contexts.
