I think Beth is on the money. I went to Penn State for undergrad, and though
I was and am a "museum goer" I never went into the museum until I saw a
poster on campus for an exhibit..that was the old Palmer Museum, not the new
and improved version. The exhibit was of Hudson River School paintings, and
the poster was wonderful (my friends and I filched them for our dorm rooms).
Before that time I guess I had the idea that museum only exhibited
ethnological materials or something of that sort, which were not of interest
to me. Of course I wasn't the average student (well, maybe grade wise and
party wise I was, but not museum wise!) Frankly, at a school like Penn
State, there is such a large population that would and had never set foot in
a museum that I'm sure the museum had a hard sell. It looks great today,
though!

-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Beth Tischler
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2002 8:56 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Question from Museum Studies Student


But seriously folks... :)
I think the major factor is that even the people who would go don't because
they take it for granted. you must advertise temporary exhibits as temporary
"limited time only" type of thing; they have to know that they can stop by
in that hour between classes; try to have student events in the museum
(utilizing meeting rooms, etc) to get the museum more involved in campus
life. I think having speakers there, too, would help. When I was in college,
Tom Stoppard (the playwright) spoke at UPenn's Anthro & Arch Museum -- lots
of students who never would have stepped in there got to see the place and a
few of us even went back -- and we were from a different school!
take my opinion as purely that -- i am not a museum studies student (yet :),
just a girl who went to undergrad in philadelphia, where every school has
some sort of museum or gallery.
beth

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at
http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed
information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message
to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help"
(without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to
[log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff
Museum-L" (without the quotes).

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).