Deb, add about a decade to each of your 20+ and 30+ scenarios, and you are
close.

[OK, bear with me, here, I am once again chiming in with the wisdom of
(moderately) old age & personal experience].

At least in the Western U.S., prior to (and during) the 1960s Museum Studies
courses were embedded in a disciplinary field. I think most often in
Anthropology, because of the Native American and other ethnographic
collections held in Anthropology and Natural History Museums that were often
on University campuses. (Notably the Burke Museum at UW, the Lowie at
UCBerkeley, the Denver Natural History Museum, and LA museums including
UCLA.)  History museums at that time were usually connected with state or
local historical societies and were staffed with people with history degrees
(larger museums) or with local historians both of whom got their museum
experience on the job. There were some exceptions such as (I think) the
Cooperstown program. Art Museums were similar.

In the late 60s and the 70s, museum studies programs started springing up in
other colleges and universities, and began more and more crossing over into
history departments, especially those with faculty interested in what was
then called "The New Social History". More and more museums required
Master's degrees. 

By the 1980s there were lots more Museum Studies courses and some were
becoming interdisciplinary, such as the one I was associated with at Oregon
State University.  Students in an interdisciplinary Master's Program could
prepare for museums in different disciplines, with basics of collection care
and management, educational programming, management, etc. that are universal
in any museum.  The wisdom of AAM guidelines written about 1980 was that
students should have a strong disciplinary background gained at the
undergraduate level in addition to museum studies courses, usually at the
Master's level --wisdom that still is good, I think. 

Having been out of academia for 10 years now, I'm not sure of the details
but there certainly are a plethora of Museum Studies programs and it seems
one is ever less sure what the actual training has been when hiring someone
with a certificate or a degree.  Overall, though, the quality and training
of people coming into the field seems to be so very much higher than it was
30 years ago.

The other great advance has been the fabulous professional training
workshops and programs sponsored by AAM, AASLH, conservation labs, etc.  The
museum professionals who came in 20 - 40 years ago (with or without a
specific Museum Studies degree) who took advantage of those are probably as
well or better trained than folks with a recent Master's in Museum Studies.
The advances in technology and changes in legal issues and funding
challenges means that what it takes to run at museum continue to change
rapidly, so those workshops will continue to be critical to those who want
to stay current in the field regardless of their academic background.

Lucy Sperlin



-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf
Of Deb Fuller
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2006 5:11 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: education vs. experience - history of museum studies programs

Eugene, et al,

On 8/13/06, Eugene Dillenburg <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I agree with Martin -- every institution is going to be different.  (In a
> large institution, you may even find differences department-to-department
> And smaller museums tended to have a greater mistrust of museum studies
> education.)  But in general, when looking for a job in exhibits, two
years'
> experience working is worth a lot more than two years of study.

Have you noticed any changing trends in education v. experience? For
example, classroom teachers usually just needed a bachelor's in
education to teach and now they are being pushed to get a master's or
even a PhD if they are teaching HS. Nurses are the same way. The
3-year nursing school is pretty much gone and most programs are the
5-year BSN.

I've noticed that "older" museum professionals, meaning ones that have
been in the field for at least 20 years, usually have a degree in
their subject area but rarely any museum-related degrees. I think most
of that is due to the fact that museum degree and certification
programs are relatively new and if you've been a director of a museum
for a number of years, you don't really have the time nor the
motivation to get another degree. I also think another factor is that
30+ years ago, most people didn't really choose to go into the museum
field. They kind of stumbled upon it and stayed.

Today, there are tons of academic museum programs and people looking
to go into the museum field. Do you think that in another 20+ years,
the paradigm will shift to people with museum-specific degrees or
certifications who choose the museum field instead of stumbled upon
it?

What about in Europe? It seems like the Europeans have had academic
museum programs longer than here in the US. (Or maybe I just know all
the old museum academians.  :)

Deb

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