As a program intern at the Museum of Natural History and hopefully a
future program assistant, I am delighted to read responses on this
listserv about the importance of education.  In my opinion, many of the
people working in museums today are still stuck in an elitist attitude.
This is evidenced by their unwillingness to educate many types of people
through a variety of programs or simply using labels for museum objects.
 
I think one of the primary responsibilities of museums is to educate.
Most people would not disagree on this point.  However, many people would
disagree on how to educate and to what extent museums should educate.  I
guess I fall to the liberal left on this issue.  I think that museums
cannot go to far to educate their constituncies.
 
By educating their visitors, museums may and I think do gain a broader
constituency.  Among the obvious ethical and moral reasons why a museum
should broaden its audience is the simple fact that a larger audience
brings in more revenue.  This is an important fact that should be
considered by museum staff who believe in an object based museum.
 
In my opinion, museums that have the widest array of programs are meeting
the needs of their community better than the museum that does not or
cannot provide this programming.  Many museums, in particular MNH focuses
on family centered learning.  This is not to say that people who are not
in the family are not welcomed, in fact quite the opposite is true.
However, the reasoning behind targeting familial audiences is that
children who have fun learning in a museum environment will hopefully be
hooked for life.
 
However, I will get off my soap box and say that I am glad that I
subscribed to this newsgroup.  I am finding great ideas in museum
programming!