Steve, I'd hazard to suggest that your experience is unique to your
situation, or at least unique to someone specializing in public
programmes.  In many smaller museums (and smaller museums--less than
four full-time paid staff--make up the majority of North American
museums), the public programmer may also be the registrar, exhibits
technician, marketing director and bookkeeper!  There are many areas
within museum work where a lot of talented people have spent decades
defining "the box" (ie., parameters for environmental controls, how to
design and maintain an integrated pest management system, loans
documentation, size, language, font and colour of exhibit labels--the
list is practically endless), and a major way that museum generalists,
or specialists in the more technical aspects of museum work, learn that
information is through museums studies programmes.  After all, just as
you wouldn't want your bookkeeper to come up with "outside the box"
means of financial reporting, you also wouldn't want "creative thinking"
that's going to put the Collections at risk, or make exhibits
intellectually inaccessible to your audience.



------------------------------------------------------------
Tim McShane, Assistant--Cultural History
Medicine Hat Museum and Art Gallery
1302 Bomford Crescent S.W.
Medicine Hat, AB   T1A 5E6
(403) 502-8587
[log in to unmask]

>>> [log in to unmask] 5/25/2004 9:49:59 AM >>>
For what it's worth, I do not have a degree in museum studies
(BA-Comparative Religion/MFA--Poetry) and had not one minute's worth
of
experience working in a museum before being hired for my first museum
job
in 1999 at the Museum of the City of New York. I did have a lot of
experience planning events, especially literary events for many years
prior to getting the job. But if there's a phrase I've heard more than
any
other since working in museums (now in my 3rd) it is "outside the box"
and
I've had the very clear impression that people hiring think of museum
studies programs (at least as regards public programs) as very much
"the
box." I have no way of knowing if my experience is unique or
widespread.

Best,,

Steve Turtell
Director of Public Programs
New-York Historical Society
Two West 77th Street
New York, NY 10024
212.485.9233
212.595.5707 fax
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