I’ve found the discussion regarding operational hours very interesting—plus a great way to remember how different each individual museum is.  Our current operational hours are Tuesday-Saturday, 10 am to 4 pm and Sunday, noon to 4.  We are closed the months of August (too darn hot) and January (who knows?).

We are not currently discussing regular evening hours, and our evening events are moderately successful.  Even though we are just south of downtown (divided by a freeway), we are considered by many to be South Dallas.  And there are tons of people who never, ever venture south of I-30 (one of our borders).  Consequently, we get few requests for evening hours.  In addition to the perception issue, we also have to consider our part-time staff—and make sure they don’t go over their 30 hour limit. 

Our biggest event of the year (Candlelight) is from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m., so we certainly have some evening hours, but I can’t imagine us having hours like that on a regular basis any time soon.  With 13 acres, we can look pretty empty in the dark.

However, we do regularly receive requests from teachers to open earlier for field trips.  So, even though our posted hours are 10, two years ago, we let teachers know that we could begin checking in school groups at 9:30.  For some, this should be 9:00.  At any rate, this has been very well-received—though we still get some groups that drive up at 9 a.m. and wonder why we’re not ready yet.  Teachers are on such a time crunch, and there’s a lot to see here.  I’m surprised that more people aren’t mentioning the needs of school groups as they consider their operational hours—they are our bread-and-butter of weekday visitation. 

 

Melissa

 

Melissa Prycer

Director of Education

214-413-3671

 

www.DallasHeritageVillage.org

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