Cindy,

The museum I work for is in Muncie, Indiana. We're an unusual museum in that we have an historic building, galleries in our main museum building that rotate exhibits every three or four months, as well as gardens and natural spaces. Our consists of 65 employees (roughly).

One of our biggest programmatic audiences are school groups. Our tours generally cater to PreK-5 and occasionally stretch into the realm of early middle school when an exhibit is appropriate. A couple of winters ago, though, we did reach a demographic we are rarely able to tap into...upper middle school and high school. The way we did this was through a combination of an exhibit that really lent itself to that age group, and we brought in a guest speaker to do a very specific program in conjunction with the theme.

The exhibit was about Anne Frank and the speaker was a holocaust survivor that came to America after the war. Her story (a verbal presentation that lasted approximately 45 minutes) in conjunction with the exhibit was able to provide information to the curriculum studied in high school in a way that students couldn't have received via a text book. Meanwhile, our own education staff created some other activities to help these older students think about and process the information given, as well as illustrate the other themes and information surrounding this time in history.

We have decided that, in general, High School students are not an age group that is looking for a field trip to our museum. However, when the right event came along, one that made sense to both the curriculum and to our site (because of the exhibit) we took the opportunity to bring them in, with the understanding that this would not be a consistent audience for us.

Until such a time where it might inherently make sense, we don't market to that age group...avoiding the proverbial attempt to try to force a square peg in a round hole.

This is one specific example, but I hope that the idea is of some use to you in your quest for information and ideas.

Sincerely,
Stephanie Dilk
Education Manager
Minnetrista

From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Cindy Boyer
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 3:26 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [MUSEUM-L] out of the box - reaching for "different" audiences?

Hello list

I am looking for examples of programs, events or services where the institution has gone beyond their "regular" audience to reach out to those who have not attended or visited before.  What has worked/not worked?

For example, an art museum used to host a type of "first Friday" evening beer/wine event on their pretty extensive grounds to attract  young adults.  It was very successful in attracting the young adults - but they stayed outside and drank beer & partied, and did not go into the museum. It seems it did not translate into that demographic visiting at another time or joining, either.

I am especially interested in the experiences of smaller institutions (under 100 staff) and historic sites or museums - but would be glad to read whatever you'd like to share.

Cindy Boyer
Director of Museums and Education
The Landmark Society of Western New York
133 S. Fitzhugh St.
Rochester NY  14608
(585) 546-7029 ext. 12
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Minnetrista Cultural Center
 1200 MInnetrista Parkway
 Muncie, Indiana
 United States
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