Small Museum Conference

In January, some of the other volunteers at the Glenn L. Martin museum talked to me about the Small Museum Conference that they attend every year. They asked me if I wanted to go, and if I did, they said the museum would pay for me. I decided that this opportunity was too good to pass up so I told them I would go. The conference was in Ocean City on February 15-17. Because of classes, I planned to only stay until Monday night instead of Tuesday, since many of the session were on Monday anyway. Because of the snow storm that Monday, many others left early as well, so I was not the only one. When I arrived that Sunday, there was a gathering for all of the attendees. I met a lot of people from companies who offer services to museums. One person I talked to was from a company that made lifelike figures to represent people for museum displays. Another company specialized in restoring and making copies of different types of documents. The woman representing that company explained the process of restoring some documents, which was very interesting and I was able to see before and after pictures of some restored documents. It is always fun to learn about behind-the-scenes work. People spend so much time and effort creating wonderful displays for museums and their work is often overlooked. Of course, these documents are not only restored for the public or museum displays, but to preserve them for future access, which is also important. One of the last groups I talked to were the graduate students from the University of Delaware. One of the students, Betsy, was very nice and gave me some good advice about being a graduate student. The next day, I had breakfast with my group while listening to a speaker discuss his experience visiting museums. He brought up some good points that made me think about what I love in museums and what I do not love. I have never really thought about how museums had affected me or other people and it was interesting to think about my experiences as an outsider. He emphasized that people respond really well to interactive displays and activities. The problem for small museums, however, is that they do not have a lot of funding and it is difficult to have more complex and interactive displays. One of the sessions I went to was about financing. Since many small museums lack funding, fundraising is very important. The presenters explained how even simple things like a donation box, memberships or an obvious donate link on the museum’s website can significantly impact funding. Overall, this conference was a great experience for me and I find myself thinking more about how museums affect people and the aspects that make them effective or ineffective in presenting ideas and sharing knowledge about specific topics.