Hi, all,

Last week I posted a query concerning open hours and I wanted to thank
everyone who responded. The information and opinions given were very
helpful.

My question this week is - what role do you feel docents should play in your
museum?

I feel that that the docents should be there to greet guests, point out
features of the exhibits, answer basic questions, handle gift shop purposes,
and provide a public face to the museum. We offer a 4-hour training and give
each docent a handbook that has facility information and FAQ sections on
both museums and the city. We explicitly tell them that they don't need to
know everything, they just need to be enthused and know where to find
information OR be willing to take a name and address so that we can get back
to them with information. We also do retrainings whenever the handbook
changes (about once a year). Now that we have hired a volunteer coordinator,
we're hoping to have more activities for the docents.

Several board members have expressed to me that they think our docents need
to know more about the history of our city in addition to basic knowledge of
the museum (or that we need to find docents who already know a great deal
about the history of our city). They feel that we either need to train them
more or be more selective. The unspoken comment is that we are seeking out a
number of docents from new arrivals in town, people who have not lived here
for more than 3 or 4 years. At a time when we are trying to double our open
hours at two museums, I think that being selective about our docents might
be tough. As far as training them more goes - I'm a little worried about
scaring them off, but willin to train them more as soon as I figure out how
much they really NEED to know to be effective docents.

Thoughts? Opinions?

Erica S. Maniez
Museum Director, Issaquah Historical Society
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