Doug Buchanan

You Need To Be Here

Do you work for an Ohio museum? Do you want to work for an Ohio museum?

You need to be at OMA 2013.

OMA 2013 is the annual conference of the Ohio Museums Association. Just about two weeks from now, on Monday, April 22, 2013, museum professionals from across the Buckeye State will gather in Sandusky at the beautiful Sawmill Creek Resort for OMA 2013.

Just once a year, Ohio museum professionals gather together to discuss everything museums are, do, and aspire to be. If you work for an Ohio museum, are a museum board member, volunteer, or have your eyes set on a museum career, you belong at OMA on April 22.

Are you a professional? Bring your business cards and network. Are you a student? Bring your resume and make yourself known to people who might end up hiring you. Are you a volunteer? Come represent the awesome force that are museum volunteers (most of us couldn’t do it without you) and share your enthusiasm for preservation and education.

And what about the cost? OMA isn’t expensive. You don’t need to fly or even spend a night away from home. Students can attend Monday’s sessions for just $35. Museum professionals can attend all of Monday’s sessions for $140, and that includes meals. Is your museum an institutional member of OMA? Your single-day registration drops to just $115.

If you’re looking for a more in-depth experience, come Sunday, April 21 for our Progressive Museum Tour and Annual Awards Program Dinner. Want even more? Come Saturday, April 20 for our pre-conference tour of historic South Bass Island.

My family’s making OMA 2013 into a full weekend, driving up form Columbus on Friday night to have fun at Sawmill Creek Resort before doing the South Bass Island pre-conference tour. My girls (ages 6 and 8) are already looking forward to getting to ride the ferry and exploring the island.

So bring your staff, bring your volunteers, and yes, even bring your family for the pre-conference activities.

Most of all, bring yourself to OMA 2013.

See you in Sandusky!

Teacher Conferences: The Top Ten Reasons Your Museum Should Be There

COSI Booth at the 2012 National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) Area Conference in Louisville, Kentucky (October 2012)

Going to teacher conferences can be expensive and time-consuming, but there are few better ways to meet and talk with a wide range of teachers in a short time. These are the same teachers who bring students to your museums, who attend your professional development sessions, and who also come to your museum with their own families. I travel to lots of teacher conferences for my museum, COSI – Columbus’ Center of Science and Industry. I find them to be a consistently rewarding and worthwhile investment of COSI’s resources.

Here are the top ten reasons (in addition to spreading the word about your great programs and resources) your museum should seek out and attend Ohio teacher conferences as an exhibitor:

1. You’ll meet leaders in education. Today I attended the Cleveland Regional Council of Science Teachers (CRCST) fall conference. I just met Bill Badders, the incoming president of the National Association of Science Teachers (NTSA), a fantastic contact. Bill also gave today’s keynote address about the current status of the new national science education standards. I’ll be able to share Bill’s slides with my colleagues back at COSI. I also had the chance to speak at length with Susan Clay, the CRCST’s incoming president, another great contact.

2. You’ll see what your competitors are offering. Okay, since we’re mostly non-profit museums, maybe “competitors” isn’t the right term, since we’re all in this together (and readily share the secrets to our successes). But still, it’s great to see what other museums are offering to the same audiences you’re working to engage.

3. You’ll see where school dollars go. At larger teacher conferences, museums usually make up a small percentage of the exhibitors. Most exhibitors I encounter are companies selling classroom technology, software, food services, even athletic field design and construction. Being a museum vendor at a conference in a sea of for-profit exhibitors will give you a good sense of who you’re competing against for limited school resources.

4. You get to meet (and talk with) your customers face-to-face. At a typical conference, I speak with dozens, or even hundreds, of teachers at COSI’s booth. You’ll learn something new with just about every conversation. Today I spoke with a teacher who’s a fan of Autopsy, one of COSI’s interactive videoconference programs. She adds all kinds of student exercises to our program that gives Autopsy a new depth. I’ll be following up with her later to connect her with the program’s director at COSI.

5. You’ll meet potential partners. At the last Science Education Council of Ohio (SECO) conference I attended, I met a sales representative from PASCO, the science lab equipment manufacturer. Later we worked out a donation of their EcoZone terrarium system that COSI was able to use as a giveaway prize for teachers. Nice!

6. You’ll get to know your own product line. Nothing prods you to study up on your own programs like knowing you’re going to be getting lots of questions directly from your customers. If there are holes in your lineup, or if your programs don’t meet teacher needs, you’ll hear about it right away.

7. Conferences can be a bargain. Yes, lots of conferences do charge (sometimes substantial) vendor fees to help offset their own costs. Yet many are surprisingly affordable, and for nonprofit museums, some are even free. You can always team up with another local museum to defray costs and spread out the time needed to staff your booth or table.

8. You’ll build your mailing list. A simple giveaway of tickets or a membership to your museum is a great way to get table visitors to join your mailing list. Make sure they know they’ll be receiving emails from your museum when they enter your drawings, though. That way you’ll stay in compliance with anti-spam legislation.

9. You don’t need to invest thousands for a great-looking and eye-catching table display. Sure, you can get a custom-imprinted tablecloth for a few hundred dollars, and it’ll last for many years, but you can spend even less with a little creativity. Okay, so I spent quite a bit over several years on my LCD TV and my pop-up COSI banners, but I spent a total of about $75 on the “cadaver” pictured above. To help promote COSI’s Autopsy interactive videoconference program, I bought a pair of latex feet and an inflatable mannequin from a haunted house supply website. A local hospital let us borrow a gurney and a set of sheets. The result? A display that few conference attendees can pass by without a comment or question. Some even stop to take pictures!

10. You’re showing support for teachers. By participating in their conferences, you’re helping affirm that teachers are critical to institutions of informal learning like museums. It’s hard to find bigger fans of museums than teachers. Just by being a part of a teacher conference, you’re showing your museum’s support for teachers and the fantastic work they do. It’s all about solidarity.

Has your museum participated in a recent teacher conference? If so, what did you learn? How did you find out about it? How did your being there benefit your museum? Here’s to seeing your museum at an Ohio teacher conference soon!

A Cornerstone Conference: OMA 2012

OMA Boardmembers with keynote speaker Dr. Spencer Crew at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Monday, April 16, 2012. From left to right: Jamie Glavic (National Underground Railroad Freedom Center), Johnna McEntee (Ohio Museums Association), William Robinson (Cleveland Museum of Art), Alex Nicholas (Massillon Museum), Mary Ann Stock (Toledo Museum of Art), Spencer Crew (George Mason University), Sharon Dean (Ohio Historical Society), Lauren Hansgen (Cleveland Artists Foundation), Joanne Fenn (Kent State University Museum), Doug Buchanan (COSI), Danielle Ross (Columbus Zoo & Aquarium), Christine Shearer (Canton Museum of Art). OMA Boardmembers not pictured: Ann Basilone (Milan Historical Museum, Inc), Darren Baker (Southern Ohio Museum and Cultural Center), Christy Davis (Pro Football Hal of Fame), Vic Fleischer (University of Akron), Robb Hyde (Wayne Center for the Arts), Julie Parke (Decorative Arts Center of Ohio), Edward Pauley (Kennedy Museum of Art), Jennifer Souers Chevraux (ICA-Art Conservation), Katherine Brown (Walsh University).

Can a conference be a cornerstone experience? I like to think so.

For the 2012 conference of the Ohio Museums Association, we examined the theme of Ohio museums as cornerstones of their communities: as centers of learning, culture, heritage and creative expression. We looked at how Ohio museums can take their greatest assets, including their collections, their programs, and even their good reputations, and to build a better and brighter future for museums and the communities they serve.

I like to think that OMA 2012 was itself a cornerstone experience for many of our attendees, particularly for our first-time and student attendees. I hope that each of us will be able to take the lessons learned and the professional contacts made and to build on those assets to strengthen our institutions and ourselves. 

We certainly couldn’t have had a better teacher than our keynote speaker, Dr. Spencer Crew. As the current Robinson Professor of American, African American, and Public History at George Mason University, Crew also served as Director of the National Museum of American History (NMAH) in Washington, D.C., and President of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, the location for our 2012 OMA conference.

Crew spoke eloquently and passionately about the concept of numen – the awe-inspiring power we grant objects of great cultural or historical significance, like the original Declaration of Independence, Abraham Lincoln’s hat, or the Apollo 11 command module. It’s the power of this concept, this numen, that draws thousands of visitors to museums both large and small.

With 117 attendees, this was our best-attended conference in years, a result I believe of a resonant theme, an inspiring venue, and a determination by Ohio museums to find ways around today’s economic obstacles to professional development. Thank you to everyone who helped make OMA 2012 such a success, including our board, volunteers, speakers, attendees, and hosts.

Was OMA 2012 a cornerstone experience for you? Why or why not?

The Best Professional Development Experience $115 Will Buy

Whither the professional development conference? I don’t think so.

In an age of easy electronic communication and tighter-than-ever budgets, it might be tempting to see conferences as old-fashioned, expensive, and unnecessary. I however can’t imagine professional development without conferences, especially in the museum world.

The best single conference for Ohio museum professionals is here: the 2012 annual conference of the Ohio Museums Association starts in Cincinnati on Sunday, April 15 and ends the following Monday afternoon; it’s a short time to invest in an opportunity that offers so much for you, your institution, your volunteers, and your board in return.

OMA is affordable: if you’re a student, you can attend OMA 2012 on Monday, April 16 for just $35. Museum professionals who are already OMA members can attend the Monday conference for just $115, and that includes breakfast and lunch.

Don’t think you have the funds? Ask a board member to sponsor you. Negotiate with your supervisor to hunt for a little budgetary wiggle room. Room and carpool with a colleague to trim costs.

When I think about all the connections I’ve made and the lessons I’ve learned at past OMA conferences, it’s easy for me to see the unique value of face-to-face professional development: things you learn in-person at conferences from your colleagues are sticky, with a long shelf life.

In this era of thin finances, this isn’t the time to isolate yourself and your institution. It’s the time to connect, to join forces, to share ideas and hear new ones. To realize that other Ohio museums are in the same boat as yours. It’s the time to get inspired.

It’s exactly the right time to invest in professional development. Register now for OMA 2012, and see you in Cincy!

Museums & Mentors: Getting Your Foot in the Door

If you’re looking to break into the museum field professionally, there’s no substitute for working as a museum volunteer or intern while you’re still in school–undergraduate or otherwise. Had I not already been working as a volunteer at the Carolinas Aviation Museum (CAM) in Charlotte, North Carolina, many years ago, I doubt I would’ve landed my first paying position in the museum world.

Working as a CAM volunteer wasn’t glamorous, but it was always fun, and occasionally offered up once-in-a-lifetime opportunities like getting to fly aboard their vintage Douglas DC-3 airliner (here’s a video taken in more recent years). I swept out the museum’s enormous hangar—a never-finished task—spent hours and hours polishing display aircraft, served as a school group docent, helped create a small exhibit, and pitched in with the endless lists of odds and ends that constantly needed attention.

When an opportunity later came along to apply for the directorship of a county history museum in small-town North Carolina, having museum experience on my resume—even as a volunteer—helped me get my foot in the door. Because of my volunteer experience, I had ample projects to discuss with the museum’s outgoing director during the job interview.

Being a museum volunteer was a terrific learning experience, and it could also be a two-way street. When I was education manager of the Battleship NEW JERSEY Museum & Memorial, I had the very good fortune to work closely with an extraordinary volunteer, former U.S. Marine and education professor Dr. Tom Banit, who, as director of our battleship’s oral history project, became my own teacher and mentor. Tom’s dedication to our museum set a high standard for all of us to work toward.

In my years in the museum world, I’ve served as a supervisor (and I hope, a mentor) to many interns and volunteers, and at least one has gone on work professionally for museums. As valuable as classroom instruction on museum practices is, there’s still no substitute for getting to know a working museum from the inside as a volunteer or intern.

If the museum of your choice doesn’t offer internship positions, don’t let that stop you. Years ago I was approached by a college student who wanted to work in our department here at COSI as a marketing intern. Gretchen didn’t seem fazed that I didn’t have a formal internship program set up—her enthusiasm prompted me to create one from scratch (I couldn’t turn down an offer of free help, after all). I’ve had interns ever since, all of whom benefitted from Gretchen’s willingness to blaze a trail.  

So if you’re contemplating a museum career—whether you’re in school or already working in another field—carve out one afternoon a week, or part of your weekend—to dip your feet in the museum pool as a volunteer or intern. The OMA website lists museums across Ohio ready to help you gain experience in museum education, preservation, membership management, and many other specialties. In almost every part of Ohio, there are bound to be museum opportunities just around the corner—even if you have to create one for yourself!

Happy landings!